SONGS 



THE DRAMATISTS 



EDITED BY 



ROBERT BELL. 




NEW-YORK: 
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, 

MDCCCLXXXII. ) -y> : 






48 6555 

Aug t ? 1942 



OK 

Francis Hart & Co. 
New-York. 






ADVEETISEMENT. 



THIS volume contains a collection of Songs from the 
English, Dramatists, beginning with the "writer of 
the first regular comedy, and ending with Sheridan. The 
want of such a collection has long been felt, and that 
it has never been supplied before must occasion sur- 
prise to all readers who are acquainted with the riches 
we possess in this branch of lyrical poetry. 

The plan upon which the work is arranged furnishes 
the means of following the course of the drama histori- 
cally, and tracing in its progress the revolutions of style, 
manners, and morals that marked successive periods. 
The songs of each dramatist are distributed under the 
titles of the plays from which they are taken; and the 
plays are given in the order of their production. Short 
biographical notices, and explanatory notes, have been 
introduced wherever they appeared necessary or desir- 
able ; but all superfluous annotation has been carefully 
avoided. 

The orthography of the early songs has been mod- 
ernized, in no instance, however, to the loss or injury 



iv Advertisement 

of a phraso essential to the coloring of the age, or the 
structure of the verse. The old spelling is not sacred ; 
nor can it be always fixed with certainty. It was gen- 
erally left to the printers, who not only differed from 
each other, but sometimes from themselves. By adopt- 
ing a uniform and familiar orthography, the enjoyment 
of the beauties of these poems, the most perfect of 
their class in any language, is materially facilitated. 

In the preparation of this volurao, all known acces- 
sible sources have been explored and exhausted. The 
research bestowod upon it cannot be adequately esti- 
mated by its bulk. The Inborn- which is not repre- 
sented in the ensuing pages considerably exceeded the 
labour which has borne the fruit and flowers gathered 
into this little book. Many hundreds of plays have 
been examined without yielding any results, or such 
only as in their nature were unavailable. Some names 
will bo missed from the catalogue of dramatic writers, 
and others will bo found to contribute loss than might 
be lookod for from their celebrity ; but in all such cases 
a satisfactory explanation can bo given. Marlow -o's 
I>lays, for example, do not contain a single song, and 
Greene's only one. Southerne abounds in songs, but 
they are furnished chiefly by other writers, and are of 
the most commonplace character. Ethercge has several 
broken snatchos of drinking rhymes and choruses dan- 
cing through his comedies, full of riotous animal 
spirits soaring to the height of nil maimer <>f extrava- 
gance, and admirably suited lo ventilate the profligacy 
of the day; but for the most part tliey are either unfit, 
for extract from their coarseness, or have not substance 



Advertisement. v 

enough to stand alone. Wycherley's songs are simply- 
gross, and Tom Killigrew's crude and artificial. 

On the other hand, some things will be found here 
that might not have been anticipated. A few plays 
with nothing else in them worth preservation have 
supplied an excellent song; and others that had long 
been consigned to oblivion by their dulness or de- 
pravity, have unexpectedly thrown up an occasional 
stanza of permanent value. 

The superiority in all qualities of sweetness, thought- 
fulness, and purity of the writers of the sixteenth and 
the boginning of the seventeenth century over their 
successors is strikingly exhibited in these productions. 
The dramatic songs of the age of Elizabeth and James I. 
are distinguished as much by their delicacy and chastity 
of feeling, as by thoir vigour and beauty. The change 
that took place under Charles II. was sudden and com- 
plete. With the Restoration, love disappears, and 
sousuousness takes its place. Voluptuous without taste 
or sentiment, tho songs of that period may be said to 
dissect in broad daylight tho life of the town, laying 
bare with revolting shamelessness the tissues of its 
most secret vices. But as this species of morbid 
anatomy required some valuation to relieve its same- 
ness, the song sometimes transported the libertinism 
into the country, and through the medium of a sort 
of Co vent-garden pastoral exhibited the fashionable 
delinquencies in a masquerade of Strephons and Chlo- 
rises, no better than the Courtalls and Loveits of the 
comedies. The costume of innocence gave increased 
zest to the dissolute wit, and the audiences seem to 



vi Advertisement. 

have been delighted with the representation of their 
own licentiousness in the transparent disguise of ver- 
dant images, and the affectation of rural simplicity. 
It helped them to a spurious ideal, which rarely, 
however, lasted out to the end of the verse. The sub- 
sequent decline of the drama is sensibly felt in the 
degeneracy of its lyrics. The interval, from the end 
of the seventeenth century to the close of the eight- 
eenth, presents a multitude of songs, chiefly, however, 
in operas which do not come strictly within the plan 
of this volume ; but, with a few solitary exceptions, 
they are trivial, monotonous, and conventional. The 
brilliant genius of Sheridan alone shines out with con- 
spicuous lustre, and terminates the series with a gaiety 
and freshness that may be regarded as a revival of 
the spirit with which it opens. 

E. B. 



CONTENTS. 



Advertisement, 

NICHOLAS UDALL. PAGE 

BALPH KOISTEB DOISTER 15 

JOHN HEYWOOD. 

THE PLAY OF LOVE 23 

JOHN STILL. 

GAMMER GURTON'S NEEDLE 33 

JOHN BEDFORD. 

The play of Wit and science 38 

THOMAS INGELEND. 

The Disobedient Child 40 

ANTHONY MUNDAY. 

JOHN A KENT AND JOHN A CUMBER 43 

LEWIS WAGEB. 

The Life and Bepentance of Mary Magdalen 45 

WILLIAM WAGEB. 

The longer thou livest the more fool thou art 46 

JOHN LYLY. 

alexander and campaspe 50 

sappho and phaon 51 

Endymion 52 

galathea 53 

MIDAS 54 

MOTHER BOMBIE 55 

GEOBGE PEELE. 

The Arraignment of Paris 58 

polyhymnia 60 

The hunting ofCupdd 61 

The Old Wife's Tale 62 

David and Bethsabe 63 



viii Contents. 

PAGE 
ROBERT GREENE. 

LOOKING-GLASS FOE LONDON AND ENGLAND 65 

THOMAS NASH. 
SUMMER'S LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT 68 

SAMUEL DANIEL. 
CLEOPATRA 73 

DABRIDGECOTJRT BELCHIER. 

Hans Beer-pot, his invisible Comedy of See Me and See 
Me Not 76 

SHAKESPEARE. 

two gentlemen of verona 77 

love's Labour Lost 78 

all's well that ends well 82 

A midsummer Night's Dream. 82 

merchant of venice _ 85 

much ado about nothing 87 

Merry Wives of Windsor. 88 

twelfth night 88 

as you like it 90 

Measure for Measure 95 

A Winter's Tale 96 

THE TEMPEST 98 

King Henry TV. Part II 100 

King Henry V 101 

KING HENRY VIII 101 

Hamlbt 102 

Cymbeltne 104 

Othello 105 

King Lear 106 

Macbeth 107 

timon of athens 108 

Troilus and Cressiba 109 

Antony and Cleopatra 109 

BEN JONSON. 

CYNTHIA'S REVELS 110 

THE POETASTER 112 

VOLPONE; OR, THE FOX 114 

THE QUEEN'S MASQUE 115 

EPICCENE: OR, THE SILENT WOMAN 116 



Contents. ix 

PAGE 

Bartholomew Fair 117 

the new inn; ok, the light heaet 120 

The Sad Shepherd; or, A Tale of Robin Hood 120 

The Forest 121 

francis beaumont and john fletcher. 

The Maid's Tragedy 122 

The Elder Brother 122 

The Spanish Curate 123 

Wit without Money 125 

beggar's bush 125 

The Humorous Lieutenant 126 

the faithful shepherdess 126 

THE MAD LOVER 137 

The Loyal Subject 139 

the False One 140 

The Little French Lawyer 142 

The Tragedy of Valenttnian 142 

Monsdsur Thomas 143 

The Chances 144 

the bloody brother; or, rollo, duke of normandy 145 

a "wtfe for a month 148 

The Lover's Progress 149 

THE PTLGRIM 149 

The Captain 150 

the queen of corinth 152 

the knight of the burning pestle 152 

the maid in the mill 156 

women pleased 156 

cupdd's revenge 157 

the two noble kinsmen 159 

the woman-hater 160 

Tlffi NICE VALOUR; OR, THE PASSIONATE MADMAN 161 

THOMAS MIDDLETON. 

Blurt, Master Constable ; or, The Spaniard's Night-walk 165 

A MAD WORLD, MY MASTERS 167 

THE WITCH 168 

MORE DISSEMBLERS BESIDES WOMEN 170 

A CHASTE MATD IN CHEAPSIDE 171 

THOMAS MIDDLETON AND WILLIAM ROWLEY. 

THE SPANISH GIPSY 171 

la 



x Contents. 

PAGE 
BEN JONSON, FLETCHER, AND MIDDLETON. 
The Widow 176 

THOMAS DEKKBE. 
OLD FORTUNATUS 177 

T. DEKKER AND R. WILSON. 
THE SHOEMAKER'S HOLDDAY ; OR, THE GENTLE CRAFT 178 

THOMAS DEKKER, HENRY CHETTLE, AND WILLIAM 

HAUGHTON. 

The Pleasant Comedy op Patient Grissell 180 

JOHN WEBSTER. 

The White Devil; or, Victoria Corombona 182 

The Duchess of Malft 183 

JOHN WEBSTER AND WILLIAM ROWLEY. 
The Thracian Wonder 184 

SAMUEL ROWLEY. 
The Noble Spanish Soldier 189 

THOMAS GOFFE. 

Orestes 190 

The Careless Shepherdess 191 

CHETTLE AND MUNDAY. 
THE DEATH OF ROBERT, EARL OF HUNTINGDON 192 

THOMAS HEYWOOD. 

THE RAPE OF LUCRECE 195 

LOVE'S MISTRESS; OR, THE QUEEN'S MASQUE 197 

FIRST PART OF KING EDWARD IV 198 

THE SILVER AGE 198 

The Fair Maid of the Exchange 198 

a challenge for beauty 199 

the golden age 201 

PHILIP MASSINGER. 

THE PICTURE 202 

THE EMPEROR OF THE EAST 203 

THE GUARDIAN 203 

JOHN FORD. 

THE SUN'S DARLING 206 

THE LOVER'S MELANCHOLY 209 



Contents. xi 



PAGE 

the broken heart 209 

The Lady's Trial. 211 

SIR JOHN SUCKLING. 

AGLAURA 212 

brennoralt 213 

the goblins 214 

The Sad One 214 

WILLIAM CABTWRIGHT. 

the Ordinary 215 

PHINEAS FLETCHER. 

THE SICELIDES 216 

WILLIAM HABINGTON. 

THE QUEEN OF ARRAGON 218 

BARTEN HOLIDAY. 

TEXNOTAMIA ; OR, THE MARRIAGE OF THE ARTS 220 

JAMES SHIRLEY. 

LOVE TRICKS 222 

The Witty Fair One 223 

The bird in a Cage 223 

The Triumph of Peace 224 

ST. Patrick for Ireland 225 

THE Arcadia 225 

Cupld and Death 226 

the contention of ajax and ulysses 227 

SIR WILLIAM DAVENANT. 

the slfge of rhodes 228 

the unfortunate lovers 229 

The Law against Lovers 231 

The Man's the Master 232 

The Cruel Brother 233 

GERVASE MARKHAM AND WILLIAM SAMPSON. 

Herod And Antipater 234 

JASPER MAYNE. 

The City Match 235 

SIR SAMUEL TUKE. 

The Adventures of Two Hours 236 



xii Contents. 

PAGE 
SIB WILLIAM KILLIGBEW. 
SELINDRA 236 

JOHN DEYDEN. 
THE INDIAN QUEEN 239 

the indian emperor 240 

secret love; or, the madden queen 240 

Sir Martin Mar- all; or, the Feigned Innocence 241 

Tyrannic Love; or, The Boyal Martyr 242 

AMBOYNA 243 

ALBION AND ALBANUS 244 

KING ARTHUR; OR, THE BRITISH WORTHY 244 

CLEOMENES; OR, THE SPARTAN HERO 245 

LOVE TRIUMPHANT ; OR, NATURE WILL PREVAIL 246 

The Secular Masque 247 

SIB GEOBGE BTHEKEGE. 
LOVE IN A TUB 247 

THOMAS SHADWELL. 

THE WOMAN CAPTAIN 248 

THE AMOROUS BIGOT 248 

TIMON OF ATHENS 249 

SIB CHABLES SEDLEY. 
THE MULBERRY GARDEN 249 

TOM D'UBFEY. 
The Comical History of Don Quixote 251 

THE MODERN PROPHETS; OR, NEW WIT FOR A HUSBAND 251 

SIB JOHN VANBBUGH. 

THE BELAPSE; OR, VIRTUE IN DANGER 252 

THE PROVOKED WLFE 253 

253 



WILLIAM CONGBEVE. 

LOVE FOR LOVE 254 

THE WAY OF THE WORLD 255 

GEOBGE FABQUHAB. 

LOVE AND A BOTTLE 256 

THE TWINS 257 

BICHABD BBINSLEY SHEBIDAN. 

THE DUENNA 257 

THE SCHOOL FOR SCANDAL 259 




SONGS FROM THE DRAMATISTS. 



NICHOLAS UDALL. 

1505—1556. 

Nicholas Udall, descended from Peter Lord Uvedale 
and Nicholas Udall, constable of Winchester Castle in the 
reign of Edward HI., 1 was born in Hampshire in 1505 or 
1506, admitted scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, 
1520, and became probationary fellow 1524, but did not 
obtain his master's degree for ten years afterwards, in con- 
sequence of his known attachment to the doctrines of 
Luther. His first literary work was a pageant in Latin 
and English, exhibited by the mayor and citizens of Lon- 
don, to celebrate the entrance of Anne Bullen into the city 
after her marriage. This was written in 1532, in con- 
junction with Leland, the antiquary, with whom he had 
formed a friendship at Oxford. In 1534, having acquired 
a high reputation for scholarship, he was appointed head 
master of Eton. His severity in this capacity rendered 
him odious to the pupils, and has been specially record- 
ed by Tusser, who says that Udall inflicted fifty-three 
stripes upon him 'for fault but small, or none at all.' 2 
Udall continued at Eton till 1541, when he was brought 
before the council at Westminster, on a charge of having 
been concerned with two of the scholars and a servant 

1 Communicated to the Gentle- ing collections for his edition of 

marts Magazine, v. lxxx., p. n. by Tusser. 

Robert Uvedale, In. reply to the 2 See the poetical life added by 

inquiries of Dr. Mavor, then mak- Tusser to his poems. 



14 Songs from the Dramatists. 

of his own in a rob bery of silver images and plate which had 
taken place at the college. There seems to be little doubt 
of his guilty knowledge of the transaction, if not of actual 
complicity in the theft, for he was dismissed from the 
mastership, and applied in vain to be restored. No further 
proceedings, however, were taken against him. From this 
time he devoted himself to literature, and took a leading 
part in the discussions against Popery. His great learning, 
and the services he rendered to religion by his controversial 
writings and his eloquence in the pulpit, were rewarded by 
his presentation to a stall at Windsor in 1551, and his 
nomination to the parsonage of Calborne, in the Isle of 
Wight, two years afterwards. These preferments in the 
church were not considered inconsistent with the encour- 
agement of his skill as a dramatic writer ; and in 1553 and 
1554 he was ordered to prepare an entertainment for the 
feast of the coronation of Queen Mary, — Dialogues and 
Interludes to be performed at court. About this time he 
was appointed head master of Westminster school, which 
he held till 1556, when the monastery was re-established 
in the November of that year. He died in the following 
month, and was buried at St. Margaret's. 1 

It had long been supposed that Gammer Gurton's Needle 
was the first regular English comedy. This supposition 
rested on the authority of Wright, the author of the Historia 
Histrionica. But the discovery, in 1818, of a copy of Ralph 
Bolster Doister, printed in 1566 (curiously enough the year 
in which Gammer Gurton's Needle was acted), transferred 
the precedence to Nicholas Udall. At what time Udall 
wrote this play is not known. The earliest reference to it 
occurs in Wilson's Rule of Reason, printed in 1551. From 
a contemporary allusion in the play to a certain ballad- 
maker, also alluded to by Skelton, who died in 1533, 
Mr. Collier conjectures that the comedy was a youthful pro- 

1 These particulars are chiefly speare Society, from the unique 

derived from Mr. W. Durrant copy in Eton College. The memoir 

Cooper's careful memoir prefixed may be consulted for a further 

to the edition of Ralph Roister account of Udall's works. 
Doister, reprinted by the Shake- 



Nicholas TJdall. 15 

duction. 1 This is extremely probable ; although the evidence 
is not decisive, as the ballad-maker alluded to might have 
survived, and maintained his notoriety many years after the 
death of Skelton. However that may be, the claim of this 
comedy to be considered the first in our language is indis- 
putable. It must have preceded Gammer Gurton's Needle 
by at least fifteen years ; and, being at that period so well 
known as to be quoted by Wilson, we may reasonably assign 
it to a much earlier date. 

The comedy is written in rhyme, and divided into acts 
and scenes. The action takes place in London, and the plot, 
constructed with a surprising knowledge of stage art, affords 
ample opportunity for the development of a variety of 
characters. The copy discovered in 1818 wants the title- 
page, but is presumed to have borne the date of 1566, as in 
that year Thomas Hackett had a license to print it. In 1818 
a limited reprint was made by the Rev. Mr. Briggs, who 
deposited the original in the library of Eton College. ' There 
was a singular propriety,' observes Mr. Collier, 'in pre- 
senting it to Eton College, as Udall had been master of the 
school ; ' a circumstance which was entirely fortuitous, Mr. 
Briggs not being acquainted even with the name of the 
author. It was reprinted in 1821 and 1830, and lastly by 
the Shakespeare Society in 1847. 



a&aljit) Kcister SBotster. 



THE WORK-GIRLS' SONG.2 

PIPE, merry Annot ; 
Trilla, Trilla, Trillarie. 
Work, Tibet; work, Annot; work, Margerie; 
Sew, Tibet; knit, Annot; spin, Margerie; 
Let us see who will win the victory. 

1 His. En. Dram. Poetry, ii. 246. 
2 To make this lively round in- sewing girls, who are variously 
telligible, the reader should "be in- employed, as indicated in the first 
formed that it is sung by three stanza. The stage directions at 



16 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Pipe, merry Annot; 

Trilla, Trilla, Trillarie. 
What, Tibet ! what, Annot ! what, Margerie ! 
Ye sleep, but we do not, that shall we try; 
Your fingers be numb, our work will not he. 

Pipe, merry Annot; 

Trilla, Trilla, Trillarie. 
Now Tibet, now Annot, now Margerie; 
Now whippet apace for the maystrie : ' 
But it will not be, our mouth is so dry. 

Pipe, merry Annot; 

Trilla, Trilla, Trillarie. 
When, Tibet ? when, Annot ? when, Margerie 1 
I will not, — I can not, — no more can I; 
Then give we all over, and there let it he ! 



THE SEWING-MEN 7 S SONG. 



A 



THING very fit 
For them that have wit, 
And are fellows knit, 
Servants in one house to be; 
As fast for to sit 
And not oft to flit, 
Nor vary a whit, 
But lovingly to agree. 

the opening of tlio scene describe clatter, in -which they are joined by 

their several occupations : ' Madge the hair-brained Bolster Bolster, 

Mumblecrust spinning on the distaff they agree to sing a song, to be- 

— Tibet Tallcatlve serving— Annot guile the time and help them on 

Alyface knitting.' After some idle in their work. 

Annot. Let all these matters pass, and we three sing a song ; 
So shall we pleasantly both the time beguile now, 
And eke dispatch all our work, ere we can tell how. 

Tibet. I shrew them that say nay, and that shall not be I. 

Madge. And I am well content. 

Tibet. Sing on then by and by. 

1 Mastery, superior skill. 



Nicholas Udall 17 

No man complaining, 

Nor other disdaining, 

For loss or for gaining. 
But fellows or friends to be ; 

No grudge remaining, 

No work refraining, 

Nor help restraining, 
But lovingly to agree. 

No man for despite, 

By word or by write, 

His fellow to twite, 
But further in honesty; 

No good turns entwite, 1 

Nor old sores recite, 

But let all go quite, 
And lovingly to agree. 

After drudgery, 

When they be weary, 

Then to be merry, 
To laugh and sing they be free ; 

With chip and cherie, 

Heigh derie derie, 

Trill on the berie, 
And lovingly to agree. 



THE MINION WIFE. 

7TTH0 so to marry a minion 2 wife, 
U-' Hath had good chance and hap, 
Must love her and cherish her all his life, 
And dandle her in his lap. 

If she will fare well, if she will go gay, 

A good husband ever still, 
What ever she list to do or to say, 

Must let her have her own will. 

Twite, entwite— to twit, to reproach. 2 Pet or darling. 



18 Songs from the Dramatists. 

About what affairs so ever lie go, 
He must shew her all his mind, 

None of his counsel she may be kept fro, 
Else is he a man unkind. 



I MUN BE MARRIED A SUNDAY. 

I MUN be married a Sunday; 
I mun be married a Sunday; 
Who soever shall come that way, 
I mun be married a Sunday. 

Roister Doister is my name ; 
Roister Doister is my name ; 
A lusty brute I am the same ; 
I mun be married a Sunday. 

Christian Custance have I found ; 
Christian Custance have I found ; 
A widow worth a thousand pound 
I mun be married a Sunday. 

Custance is as sweet as honey ; 
Custance is as sweet as honey ; 
I her lamb, and she my coney ; 
I mun be married a Sunday. 

When we shall make our wedding feast, 
When we shall make our wedding feast, 
There shall be cheer for man and beast, 
I mun be married a Sunday. 

I mun be married a Sunday. * 

1 The following passage occurs in the Taming of the Shrew :— 
We will have rings, and things, and fine array ; 
And kiss me, Kate, we will be married o' Sunday. 

Act ii, Sc. 1. 
The concluding words, probably Ralph Roister Doister's song, which 
intended to be sung with a fine air we may, therefore, infer to have 
of banter and bravery by Petruchio been one of the popular ballads in 
as he goes off the stage, are evi- Shakespeare's time, 
dently taken from the burthen of 



John Heywood. 19 

THE PSALMODIE FOR THE REJECTED LOVER. 

mAISTER Roister Doister will straight go home and 
die, 
Our Lord Jesus Christ his soul have mercy upon : 
Thus you see to day a man, to morrow John. 

Yet, saving for a woman's extreme cruelty, 
He might have lived yet a month, or two, or three ) 
But, in spite of Custance, which hath him wearied, 
His mashyp shall be worshipfully buried. 
And while some piece of his soul is yet him within, 
Some part of his funeral let us here begin. 
Binge. He will go darkling to his grave ; 
Neque lux, neque crux, nisi solum clink ; 
Never genman so went toward heaven, I think. 
Yet, sirs, as ye will the bliss of heaven win, 
When he cometh to the grave, lay him softly in j 
And all men take heed, by this one gentleman, 
How you set your love upon an unkind woman ; 
For these women be all such mad peevish elves, 
They will not be won, except it please themselves. 
But, in faith, Custance, if ever ye come in hell, 
Maister Roister Doister shall serve you as well. 

Good night, Roger old knave j Farewell, Roger old 

knave; 
Good night, Roger old knave ; knave knap. 
Nequando. Audivi vocem. Requiem ceternam. 

[A peal of bells rung by the Parish Cleric 
and Roister Doister 1 s four men. 



JOHN HEYWOOD. 

157-. 

John Heywood's claims to a prominent place amongst 
the dramatists are not very considerable. His productions 
in this way are neither numerous nor important. They can 



20 Songs from the Dramatists. 

scarcely be called plays, in the higher sense of the term, 
and are more accurately described by the designation usually 
applied to them of Interludes, having few characters and 
scarcely any plot, and consisting entirely of nninterrupted 
dialogue, without an attempt at action or structural design. 
They may be said to represent the transition from the Mo- 
ralities to the regular drama ; and in this point of view they 
possess a special interest. 

The date of Heywood's birth is not known, nor has the 
place been ascertained with certainty. According to Bale 
and Wood, he was born in the city of London, and received 
his education in the University of Oxford, at the ancient 
hostel of Broadgate, in St. Aldgate's parish. Other writers 
assert that he was born at North Mimms, near St. Alban's, 
Hertfordshire, where the family had some property, and at 
which place he lived after he left college ; while a MS. in the 
possession of the Earl of Ellesmere describes him as a native 
of Kent, 

Heywood had no inclination for the life of a student. His 
tastes lay in music, good fellowship, and ' mad, merry wit ; ' 
and, as he tells us in one of his epigrams, he applied himself 
to ' mirth more than thrift.' That he profited little by his 
residence at Oxford may be inferred from an observation 
made by Puttenham, who ascribes the favour in which he 
stood at Court to his 'mirth and quickness of conceit more 
than any good learning that was in him.' In Hertfordshire 
he became acquainted with Sir Thomas More, who lived in 
the neighbourhood, and who was so well pleased with his 
aptness for jest and repartee, qualities in much request at 
that period with the reigning monarch, that he not only 
introduced him to Henry VlLL, but is said to have assisted 
him in composition of his epigrams. He became a great 
favourite with the king, who appears, from the Book of Pay- 
ments, to have taken him into his service as a player on the 
virginal ; and gratuities from both the princesses are to be 
found amongst the items of the royal expenditure. In addi- 
tion to his wit and his music, he appears also to have had 



John Heywood. 21 

some talent as an actor, and to have presented an interlude 
at court (written no doubt by himself), played, according 
to the fashion then prevalent, by children. Heywood was 
a staunch Roman Catholic, a circumstance to which, we may 
presume, he was mainly indebted for the particular favours 
bestowed upon him by the Princess Mary, who admitted him 
to the most intimate conversation during the time of Henry 
Vm. and the succeeding reign; and conferred a distin- 
guished mark of her patronage upon him when she came to 
the throne, by appointing him to address her in a Latin and 
English oration on her procession through the city to West- 
minster the day before her coronation. These were the 
palmy days of Heywood's career. The queen was so great 
an admirer of his humorous talents that she constantly 
sent for him to beguile the hours of illness, and is said 
to have sought relief from pain in his diverting stories 
even when she was languishing on her death-bed. ' His 
stories,' observes Chalmers, 'must have been diverting, 
indeed, if they soothed the recollections of such a 
woman.' 

Upon the death of Queen Mary he suffered the reverse 
which attended most of her personal adherents. The Prot- 
estant religion was now in the ascendancy, and Heywood 
had been so conspicuous a follower of the late sovereign, 
that he either could not endure to live under the rule of her 
successor, or was apprehensive that his safety would be jeop- 
ardized if he remained in England. He accordingly left the 
kingdom, and settled at Mechlin, in Belgium, where Wood 
informs us he died in 1565. The Ellesmere MS., however, 
says that he was still living in 1576. He left two sons, 
Ellis and Jasper, who both became Jesuits, and were eminent 
for their learning. 

In private life Heywood was a humorist and a jovial com- 
panion. The same character pervades his writings, which 
derived their popularity in his own time mainly from his 
social talents and his position at court. He began to write 
about 1530; and his interludes, with one exception, were 



22 Songs from the Dramatists. 

published in 1533. 1 His parable upon Queen Mary, 
called Tlie Spider and the Fly, appeared in 1556, and his 
epigrams, by "which he is best known to modern readers, 
in 1576. 

The Flay of Lave, from which the following sorjg is 
extracted, affords a fair sample of his dramatic system. 
The characters are mere abstractions — a Lover loving and 
not loved, a Woman loved and not loving, and a Vice who 
neither loves nor is loved. The dialogue draws out these 
metaphysical entities into a discourse which much more 
nearly resembles the application of the exhausting process 
to a very dull argument than the development of a passion. 
In the song taken from this play, Heywood adopts the vein 
of Skelton, who died in 1529, and who was not, as has 
been stated, one of his contemporaries. Heywood rarely 
displayed much tenderness of feeling, or an instinct of 
the beautiful; but more of these qualities will be found 
in this song, and in his verses on the Princess Mary, 2 
than might be expected from the general character of 
his writings. 

1 For an account of these inter- Tottel's version will be found com- 
ludes the reader may be referred to plete amongst the specimens of 
Mr. Fairholt's excellent introduc- minor poets contemporaneous with 
tion to Heywood's Dialogue on Wit Surrey, in the volume of Surrey's 
and Folly, printed by the Percy Poems, Ann. Eel. p. 237. It is there 
Society, from the original MS. in inserted, as it had been previously 
the British Museum. copied by Ellis, amongst the ' Un- 

2 Harleian MS., Xo. 1703. This certain Authors,' and a conjecture 
poem, entitled A Description of a hazarded from internal evidence 
most Noble Lady, was printed in that it might have been written by 
Park's edition of Walpole's Royal George Boleyn. There is no doubt, 
and Noble Authors, and a modern- however, that the poem in the 
ized copy of it is given in Evans's Harleian MS. was written by Hey- 
Old Ballads; another and a different wood, and that the share which 
version, in wh ich some stanzas are the 'uncertain author,' whoever 
omitted, and others altered, was he may have been, had in Tottel's 
published in Tottel's Miscellany, version, consisted in imparting 
amongst the contributions of ' Un- certain refinements to the original, 
certain Authors,' and quoted in by which the sweetness and beauty 
that form (with the exception of a of the expression are much height- 
single verse) in Ellis's Specimens, ened. . 



John Heywood. 23 

Sfje $las of Hobe. 



IN PRAISE OF HIS LADY. 

AND to begin 
At setting in : 
First was her skin 
White, smooth and thin, 
And every vein 
So bine seen plain j 
Her golden hair 
To see her wear, 
Her wearing gear, 
Alas ! I fear 
To tell all to you, 
I shall undo you. 
Her eye so rolling 
Each heart controlling ; 
Her nose not long, 
Her stode not wrong : 
Her finger tips 
So clean she clips ; 
Her rosy lips, 
Her cheeks gossips 
So fail*, so ruddy, 
It axeth study 
The whole to tell 5 
It did excel. 
It was so made 
That even the shade 
At every glade 
Would hearts invade : 
The paps small, 
And round withal ; 



24 Songs from the Dramatists. 

The waist not mickle, 
But it was tickle : 1 
The thigh, the knee, 
As they should be ; 
But such a leg, 
A lover would beg 
To set eye on, 
But it is gone : 
Then, sight of the foot 
Bift hearts to the root. 

The four songs that follow are derived from another 
source. There is no evidence to show that they were writ- 
ten for the stage, although it is not improbable that some 
of them might have been sung in the interludes. Whether 
such a supposition may be considered sufficient to justify 
their insertion in this collection, I will not pretend to deter- 
mine; but the reader who takes an interest in our early 
ballads will discover an ample reason for their introduction 
in the broad light they throw upon the lyrical poetry of the 
sixteenth century, and especially upon the peculiar style 
and manner of Heywood. 

These four songs, together with many others, are con- 
tained in the same MS. with Bedford's play of Wit and 
Science, which belonged to the late Mr. Bright, and was 
printed in 1848 by the Shakespeare Society, under the 
discriminating editorship of Mr. Halliwell. ' The collection 
of songs by John Heywood and others/ observes Mr. Halli- 
well, ' is of considerable interest to the poetical antiquary ; 
some are remarkably curious, and all of them belong to a 
period at which the reliques of that class of composition 
are exceedingly rare, and difficult to be met with.' 

The collection contains eight songs by Heywood. The 
four here selected are intrinsically the best, and the most 
characteristic of the manner of the writer. 

llta the sense of exciting. Tyckyll er was uncertain weather. Hence 

also meant unsteady, uncertain, the modern phrase ticklish— a tlck- 

doubtful. A thing wns tickle that lish case, a doubtful case, 
did not stand firmly— tickle weath- 



K 



John Heywood. 25 



THE SONG OF THE GREEN WILLOW.i 

LL a green willow, willow, 
All a green willow is my garland. 



Alas ! by what means may I make ye to know 
The unkindness for kindness that to me doth grow ? 
That one who most kind love on me should bestow, 
Most unkind unMndness to me she doth show, 
For all a green willow is my garland ! 

To have love and hold love, where love is so sped, 
Oh ! delicate food to the lover so fed ! 
From love won to love lost where lovers be led, 
Oh ! desperate dolor, the lover is dead ! 

For all a green willow is his garland ! 

She said she did love me, and would love me stilly 
She swore above all men I had her good will ; 
She said and she swore she would my will fulfil j 
The promise all good, the performance all ill ; 
For all a green willow is my garland ! 

1 The ballad, of which a fragment of Heywood' s song extant. It ia 

is sung by Desdemona, (Othello, Act extracted from an anonymous prose 

iv. Scene ill.), derives its burthen comedy, called Sir Gyles Goose- 

from this song, which Mr. Halliwell cappe, presented by the children 

observes is, perhaps, the oldest in of the chapel, and printed in 1606. 

our language with the willow bur- The canto winds up the piece, and 

then. There are many other songs the allusion to the willow bears 

with the same refrain of a later upon a boasting Captain who is left 

date. The following verse, or canto, without a bride in the end. 
Is probably the earliest imitation 

Willow, willow, willow, 

Our captain goes down : 
Willow, willow, willow, 

His valour doth crown. 
The rest with rosemary we grace, 

O Hymen, light thy light. 
With richest rays gild every face, 

And feast hearts with delight. 
Willow, willow, willow, 

We chaunt to the skies : 
And with black and yellow, 

Give courtship the prize. 



26 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Now, woe with, the willow, and woe with the wight 
That windeth willow, willow garland to dight ! 
That dole dealt in allmys 1 is all amiss quite ! 
"Where lovers are beggars for allmys in sight, 

No lover doth beg for this willow garland ! 

Of this willow garland the burden seems small, 
But my break-neck burden I may it well call ; 
Like the sow of lead on my head it doth fall I 
Break head, and break neck, back, bones, brain, heart 
All parts pressed in pieces ! [and all ; 

Too ill for her think I best things may be had, 
Too good for me thinketh she things being most bad, 
All I do present her that may make her glad, 
All she doth present me that may make me sad ; 

This equity have I with this willow garland ! 

Could I forget thee, as thou canst forget me, 
That were my sound fault, which, cannot nor shall be ; 
Though thou, like the soaring hawk, every way flee, 
I will be the turtle still steadfast to thee, 

And patiently wear this willow garland ! 

All ye that have had love, and have my like wrong, 
My like truth and patience plant still ye among ; 
When feminine fancies for new love do long, 
Old love cannot hold them, new love is so strong, 
For all. 



B 



BE MERRY, FRIENDS. 2 

E merry, friends, take ye no thought, 
For worldly cares care ye right nought ; 



1 The allmys-dish, or alms-dish, version of tliis song, taken from a 
was the dish in the old halls and broadside printed soon after 1600. 
country houses where bread was It contains some additional stan- 
placed for the poor. zas, which I have inserted in brack- 

2 In the collection called A Book ets to distinguish them from the 
of Boxburghe Ballads, edited by version given by Mr. Halliwell. 
Mr. Collier, there is a modernized 



John Heywood. 27 

For whoso doth, when all is sought, 
Shall find that thought availeth nought j 
Be merry, friends ! 

All such as have all wealth at will, 
Their wills at will for to fulfil. 
From grief or grudge or any ill 
I need not sing this them until, 

Be merry, friends ! 

But unto such as wish and want 
Of worldly wealth wrought them so scant, 
That wealth by work they cannot plant, 
To them I sing at this instant, 

Be merry, friends ! 

And such as when the rest seem next, 
Then they be straight extremely vexed ; 
And such as be in storms perplexed, 
To them I sing this short sweet text, 
Be merry, friends! 

To laugh and win each man agrees, 
But each man cannot laugh and lose, 
Yet laughing in the last of those 
Hath been allowed of sage decrees ; 
Be merry, friends! 

Be merry with sorrow, wise men have said, 
Which saying, being wisely weighed, 
It seems a lesson truly laid 
For those whom sorrows still invade, 
Be merry, friends ! 

Make ye not two sorrows of one, 
For of one grief grafted alone 
To graft a sorrow thereupon, 
A sourer crab we can graft none ; 

Be merry, friends ! 



28 Songs from the Dramatists, 

Taking our sorrows sorrowfully, 
Sorrow augmenteth our malady; 
Taking our sorrows merrily, 
Mirth salveth sorrows most soundly; 
Be merry, friends ! 

Of griefs to come standing in fray, 
Provide defence the best we may ; 
Which done, no more to do or say, 
Come what come shall, come care away ! 
Be merry, friends ! 

In such things as we cannot flee, 
But needs they must endured be, 
Let wise contentment be decree 
Make virtue of necessity ; 

Be merry, friends ! 

To lack or lose that we would win, 
So that our fault be not therein, 
What woe or want, end or begin, 
Take never sorrow but for sin ! 

Be merry, friends I 

In loss of friends, in lack of health, 
In loss of goods, in lack of wealth, 
Where liberty restraint expelleth, 
Where all these lack, yet as this telleth, 
Be merry, friends ! ' 

Man hardly hath a richer thing 
Than honest mirth, the which well-spring 
Watereth the roots of rejoicing, 
Feeding the flowers of flourishing ; 

Be merry, friends ! 2 

1 In the Boxburghe copy this verse is thus modernized :— 

If friends be lost, then get thee more ; 
If wealth be lost, thon still hast store — 
The merry man is never poor, 
He lives upon the world ; therefore, 

Be merry, friends ! 

2 This verse is omitted in the Boxburghe copy. 



John Heywood. 29 

[The loss of wealth is loss of dirt, 
As sages in all times assert ; 
The happy man's without a shirt, 
And never comes to maim or hurt. 
Be merry, friends ! 

All seasons are to him the spring', 
In flowers bright and flourishing ; 
With birds upon the tree or wing, 
Who in their fashion always sing 

Be merry, friends ! 

If that thy doublet has a hole in, 
Why, it cannot keep the less thy soul in, 
Which rangeth forth beyond controlling 
Whilst thou hast nought to do but trolling 
Be merry, friends !] 

Be merry in God, saint Paul saith plain, 
And yet, saith he, be merry again ; 
Since whose advice is not in vain, 
The fact thereof to entertain, 

Be merry, friends ! 

[Let the world slide, let the world go : 
A fig for care, and a fig for woe! 
If I can't pay, why I can owe, 
And death makes equal the high and low. 
Be merry, friends !] 

IDLENESS. 

7TVHAT heart can think, or tongue express, 
*** The harm that groweth of idleness ? 

This idleness in some of us 

Is seen to seem a thing but slight ; 
But if that sum the sums discuss, 

The total sum doth show us straight 

This idleness to weigh such weight 
That it no tongue can well express, 
The harm that groweth of idleness. 



30 Songs from the Dramatists. 

This vice I liken to a weed 

That husband-men have named tyne, 

The which in corn doth root or breed ; 
The grain to ground it doth incline 
It never ripeth, but rotteth in fine ; 

And even a like thing is to guess 

Against all virtue, idleness. 

The proud man may be patient, 

The ireful may be liberal, 
The gluttonous may be continent, 

The covetous may give alms all, 

The lecher may to prayer 1 fall; 
Each vice bideth some good business, 
Save only idle idleness. 

As some one virtue may by grace 

Suppress of vices many a one, 
So is one vice once taken place 

Destroyeth all virtues every one ; 

Where this vice cometh, all virtues are gone, 
In no kind of good business 
Can company with idleness. 

An ill wind that bloweth no man good, 

The blower of which blast is she ; 
The lyther 2 lusts bred of her brood 

Can no way breed good property 5 

Wherefore I say, as we now see, 
No heart can think, or tongue express, 
The harm that groweth of idleness ! 

To cleanse the corn, as men at need 

Weed out all weeds, and tyne for chief, 

Let diligence our weed-hook weed 
All vice from us for like relief ; 
As faith may faithfully show proof 

By faithful fruitful business, 

To weed out fruitless idleness. 

1 This word was constantly used as a dissyllable. 2 Lazy. 



John Seywood. 31 



WELCOME IS THE BEST DISH. 

YE be welcome, ye be welcome, 
Ye be welcome one by one ; 
Ye be heartily welcome, 

Ye be heartily welcome every one ! 

When friends lake friends do friendly show 
Unto each other high and low, 
What cheer increase of love doth grow, 
What better cheer than they to know ! 

This is welcome ! 
To bread or drink, to flesh or fish, 
Yet welcome is the best dish ! 

In all our fare, in all our cheer 
Of dainty meats sought far or near, 
Most fine, most costly to appear, 
What for all this, if all this gear 

Lack this welcome? 
This cheer, lo ! is not worth one rush, 
For welcome is the best dish ! 

Where welcome is, though fare be small, 
Yet honest hearts be pleased withal ; 
When welcome want, though great fare fall, 
No honest heart content it shall 

Without welcome ; 
For honest hearts do ever wish 
To have welcome to the best dish. 

Some with small fare they be not pleased ; 
Some with much fare be much diseased ; 
Some with mean fare be scant appeased ; 
But of all somes none is displeased 

To be welcome ! 
Then all good cheer to accomplish, 
Welcome must be the best dish. 



32 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Yet some to this will say that they 
Without welcome with meat live may, 
And with welcome without meat, nay ! 
Wherefore meat seems best dish, they say, 

And not welcome ! 
But this vain saying to banish, 
We will prove welcome here best dish. 

Though in some case, for man's relief, 
Meat without welcome may be chief ; 
Yet where man come, as here in proof, 
Much more for love than hunger's grief, 

Here is welcome. 
Thorough all the cheer to furnish, 
Here is welcome the best dish. 

What is this welcome now to tell ? 
Ye are welcome, ye are come well, 
As heart can wish your coming fell, 
Your coming glads my heart each dell ! 

This is welcome ! 
Wherefore all doubts to relinquish, 
Your welcome is your best dish. 

Now as we have in words here spent 
Declared the fact of welcome meant, 
So pray we you to take the intent 
Of this poor dish that we present 

To your welcome, 
As heartily as heart can wish 5 
Your welcome is here your best dish ! 




JOHN STILL. 

1543—1607. 

There is little known of the life of John Still beyond the 

incidents of his preferments in the church. He was the son 

of William Still, of Grantham, in Lincolnshire, where he was 



John Still 33 

born in 1543. He took the degree of M.A. at Christ's 
College, Cambridge, where he was made Margaret Professor 
in 1570 ; and in subsequent years was elected Master of St. 
John's, and afterwards of Trinity College. In 1571 he was 
presented to the Eectory of Hadleigh, in Suffolk, commis- 
sioned one of the Deans of Booking in 1572, collated to the 
vicarage of Eastmarham, in Yorkshire, in 1573, and in- 
stalled Canon of Westminster and Dean of Sudbury in 
1576. He was chosen prolocutor of convocation in 1588, 
promoted in 1592 to the see of Bath and Wells, and held 
the bishopric till his death in 1607, having amassed a 
large fortune by the Mendip lead mines in the diocese, and 
endowed an almshouse in Wales, to which he bequeathed 
£500. Bishop Still was twice married, and left a large 
family. His excellent character is attested by Sir John 
Harrington, who says, that he was a man Ho whom he 
never came, but he grew more religious, and from whom he 
never went but he parted more instructed.' 

The comedy of Gammer Gurton's Needle was originally 
printed in 1575, but written several years earlier. It is 
composed in rhyme, and regularly divided into acts and 
scenes. The plot is meagre and silly, the whole of the five 
acts being occupied by a hunt after a needle which Gammer 
Gurton is supposed to have mislaid, but which is found, by 
way of catastrophe, in a garment she had been mending. 
The altercations, quarrels, mishaps, and cross-purposes, 
arising out of this circumstance constitute the entire sub- 
stance of the piece. The dialogue is coarse, even for the 
age in which it was written, and the humour seldom rises 
above the level of clowns and buffoons. 

hammer burton's HeeUle* 



B 



DRINKING SONG. 1 

ACK and side go bare, go bare, 
Both foot and hand go cold : 



1 Warton, in liia History of Poets, Chanson a boire of any merit in 
ill. 206, quotes this song as the first our language. He says it appeared 

2a 



34 Songs from the Dramatists. 

But belly, God send thee good ale enough, 
Whether it be new or old. 
I can not eat, but little meat, 
My stomach is not good j 



in 1551. This must be an over- very curious and interesting ; but 
sigbt, if Still is to be considered the most striking point of variance 
the author, as he was then only is the omission of the verse refer- 
eight years old. The comedy was ring to Tyb.GammerGurton's maid, 
produced in 1566, and printed for which suggests the probability that 
the first time in 1575. This song, the song may have been origin- 
observes Warton, 'has a vein of ally an independent composition, 
ease and humour which we should of which Bishop Still availed him- 
not expect to have been inspired by self, adapting it to the comedy 
the simple beverage of those times.' by curtailments and a new verse 
Still less might it have been ex- with a personal allusion. There are 
pected from the writer of the dia- many instances of a similar use 
logue of this piece, the versification being made of popular ballads by 
of which is harsh and lumbering, the old dramatists. How far thia 
Whether Bishop Still really wrote conjecture is justifiable, must be 
the song, may be doubted. Mr. determined by a comparison be- 
Dyce, in his edition of the Skelton's tween the above version and that 
works, gives another version of it given by Mr. Dyce, which is here 
from a MS. in his possession, which subjoined in the orthography of the 
he says is certainly of an earlier original 
date than 1575. The differences are 



backe & syde goo bare goo bare 
bothe hande & fote goo colde 
but belly god sende the good ale inowghe 
whether hyt be newe or olde. 



but yf that I may have trwly 

good ale my belly full 

I shall looke lyke one by swete sainte Johnn 

were shoron agaynste the woole 

thowte I goo bare take you no care 

I am nothing colde 

I stuffe my skynne so full within 

of joly goode ale & olde. 



I cannot eate but lytyll meate 

my stomaeke ys not goode 

but sure I thyncke that I cowd dryncke 

with hym that werythe an hoode 

dryncke is my lyf e althowghe my wyf e 

some tyme do chyde & scolde 

yet spare I not to plye the potte 

of joly goode ale & olde. 

backe & syde, &c. 



John Still 35 

But sure I think, that I can drink 

With him that wears a hood. 
Though I go bare, take ye no care, 

I am nothing a cold. 
I stuff my skin so full within, 

Of jolly good ale and old. 



I love noo roste but a browne toste 

or a crabbe in the fyer 

a lytyll breade snail do me steade 

mooclie breade I neuer desyer 

nor froste nor snowe nor wynde I trow 

canne hurte me yf hyt wolde 

I am so wrapped within & lapped 

with joly goode ale & olde. 

backe & syde, <fcc. 



I care ryte nowghte I take no thowte 

for clothes to kepe me warme 

have I goode dryncke I surely thyncke 

nothynge canne do me harme 

for trwly than I f eare noman 

be he neuer so bolde 

when I am armed and throwly warmed 

with joly goode ale & olde. 

backe & syde, &c. 

but nowe & than I curse & banne 

they make ther ale so small 

god geve them care and evill to f aare 

they strye the malte and all 

sooche pevisshe pewe I tell yowe trwe 

not for a c[r]ovne of golde 

ther commethe one syppe within my lyppe 

whether hyt be newe or olde. 

backe & syde, &c. 



good ale & stronge makethe me amonge 

full joconde & full lyte 

that ofte I slepe & take no kepe 

from mornygne vntyll nyte 

then starte I vppe & fle to the cuppe 

the ryte waye on I holde 

my thurste to staunche I fyll my paynche 

with joly goode ale & olde. 

backe & syde, &c. 



and kytte my wife that as her lyf e 
lovethe well goode ale to seke 



36 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Back and side go bare, go bare, 
Both foot and band go cold j 

But belly, God send thee good ale enough, 
"Whether it be new or old. 

I love no roast, but a nut-brown toast, 

And a crab laid in the fire, 
A little bread shall do me stead, 

Much bread I not desire. 
No frost nor snow, no wind, I trow, 

Can hurt me if I wold, 
I am so wrapt, and throwly 1 lapt, 

Of jolly good ale and old. 

Back and side go bare, &c. 

And Tyb my wife, that as her life 

Loveth well good ale to seek, 
Full oft drinks she, till ye may see 

The tears run down her cheeks ; 
Then doth she trowl to me the bowl, 

Even as a malt worm should ; 
And saith, sweetheart, I took my part 

Of this jolly good ale and old. 

Back and side go bare, &c. 

full ofte drynkythe she that ye maye se 

the tears ronne downe her cheke 

then doth she troule to me the bolle 

as a goode malte worme sholde 

<fe saye swete harte I have take my parte 

of joly goode ale & olde. 

backe & syde, &c. 

they that do dryncke tyll they nodde & wyncke 

even as goode fellowes sholde do 

they shall notte mysse to have the blysse 

that goode ale hathe browghte them to 

& all poore sonles that skowre blacke holies 

& them hathe Instely trowlde 

god save the lyves of them & ther wyves 

wether they be yonge or olde. 

backe & syde, &c. 

1 Thoroughly. 



John Bedford. 37 

Now let them drink, till they nod and wink, 

Even as good fellows should do, 
They shall not miss to have the bliss 

Good ale doth bring men to : 
And all poor souls that have scoured bowls, 

Or have them lustily trowled, 
God save the lives of them and their wives, 

Whether they be young or old. 

Back and side go bare, &c. 




JOHN BEDFORD. 
15— . 

John Redford was a contemporary of John Heywood's, 
a fact sufficiently shown by the MS. of Wit and Science, 
already referred to, which Mr. Halliwell thinks is probably 
contemporary with the author, and which includes several 
songs by Heywood. Of John Redford nothing more is 
known than is disclosed by the MS., which contains the 
moral play of Wit and Science, and a few lines of two other 
interludes by the same author. Mr. Collier conjectures that 
Redford was a professor of music, perhaps employed at 
court. Wit and Science, which is after the manner of Hey- 
wood's interludes, must have been written sometime in the 
reign of Henry VIH., probably towards its close. The 
characters, like those in Heywood's pieces, are pure abstrac- 
tions, and their conversation throughout consists of the 
same sort of dreary discussion, mottled over with the 
species of word-catching in vogue at that period. ' The 
dialogue,' says Mr. Halliwell, 'is not in some respects 
without humour, but the poetry is too contemptible to be 
patiently endured.' 

The song is curious as an illustration of the manner of those 
interludes. It is supposed to be sung by a character called 
Honest Recreation, coming in to the help of Wit, who has 
been overthrown in a contest with Tediousness, and who, 



38 ' Songs from the Dramatists. 

according to the stage directions, ' f alleth down and dieth,' 
when he is recovered by Honest Recreation, with the assist- 
ance of his friends Comfort, Quickness, and Strength. 



STtie $lag of ©8m anti Science* 



SONG OF HONEST RECREATION. 
1 

7TVHEN travels grete 1 in matters thick 

>^y Have dulled your wits and made them sick, 

What medicine, then, your wits to quick, 

If ye will know, the best physic, 

Is to give place to Honest Recreation : 

Give place, we say now, for thy consolation. 

2 
Where is that Wit that we seek than •? 
Alas ! he lyeth here pale and wan : 
Help him at once now, if we can. 
0, Wit ! how doest thou ? Look up, man. 

0, Wit! give place to Honest Recreation — 
Give place, we say now, for thy consolation, 
3 
After place given let ear obey : 
Give an ear, Wit ! now we thee pray j 
Give ear to what we sing and say \ 
Give an ear and help will come straightway : 
Give an ear to Honest Recreation; 
Give an ear now, for thy consolation. 
4 
After ear given, now give an eye : 
Behold, thy friends about thee He, 
Recreation I, and Comfort I, 
Quickness am I, and Strength here bye. 
Give an eye to Honest Recreation : 
Give an eye now, for thy consolation. 

1 Become enlarged. 



Thomas Ingelend. 39 

5 

After an eye given, an hand give ye: 

Give an hand O Wit! feel that ye see; 

Recreation feel, feel Comfort free ; 

Feel Quickness here, feel Strength to thee. 
Give an hand to Honest Recreation: 
Give an hand now, for thy consolation. 
6 

Upon his feet, would God he were ! 

To raise him now we need not fear; 

Stay you his hand, while we here bear: 

Now, all at once upright him rear. 

Wit ! give place to Honest Recreation : 
Give place, we say now, for thy consolation. 



THOMAS INGELEND. 

15— . 

All the information that has come down to us respecting 
Thomas Ingelend is to be found on the title-page of the 
interlude of the Disobedient Child, where he is designated 
as 'late student in Cambridge.' It is the only literary 
record by which he is known. The original edition has no 
date, but Mr. Halliwell, who edited a reprint of it for the 
Percy Society, thinks it was published about 1560. Mr. 
Collier remarks that the Disobedient Child is less like a 
moral play than most others of the same class, the introduc- 
tion of the Devil, in the usual manner, constituting its 
strongest resemblance to that species of dramatic represen- 
tation. In other points of view it approaches more nearly to 
the realization of the actual characters of every-day life than 
the dramatic allegories of Heywood. The persons of the 
drama, instead of representing abstract qualities, indicate 
certain social conditions and relations that are brought into 
direct collision by the story. Thus we have the Bich Man, 



40 Songs from the Dramatists. 

and the Rich Man's Son, the Young Woman, whom the 
Rich Man's Son is determined to marry against the wishes of 
his father, the Priest who marries them, and the Devil who 
stirs np strife in their household. The titles of these 
characters reveal the plot, and the following illustrates the 
main incident, the resolution of the son to pursue his own 
inclinations in opposition to the will of his father — a brave 
resolution, for which he pays dearly in the sequel. The 
Young Woman turns out a vixen, and after she has beaten 
him and rendered him sufficiently miserable, he is glad to 
make his escape from her, and seek refuge in his father's 
house. 

2Tt>e Winohtnitnt ©tnto* 



MY FANTASY WILL NEVER TURN. 

CT PITE of his spite, 1 which that in vain, 
H^ Doth seek to force my fantasy, 
I am professed for loss or gain, 
To be thine own assuredly: 

Wherefore let my father spite and spurn, 

My fantasy will never turn ! 

Although my father of busy wit, 
Doth babble still, I care not though ; 
I have no fear, nor yet will flit, 
As doth the water to and fro ,• 
Wherefore, &c. 

For I am set and will not swerve, 
Whom spiteful speech removeth nought ; 
And since that I thy grace deserve 
I count it is not dearly bought ; 
Wherefore, &c. 

1 Anger. 
'And that which spites me more than all these wants.' 

Shakespeare. 



Thomas Ingelend. 41 

Who is afraid, let yon him fly, 
For I shall well abide the brunt : 
Maugre to his lips that listeth to lie, 
Of busy brains as is the wont 5 
Wherefore, &c. 

Who listeth thereat to laugh or lour, l 
I am not he that aught doth reach j 
There is no pain that hath the power, 
Out of my breast your love to fetch ; 
Wherefore, &c. 

For whereas he moved me to the school, 
And only to follow my book and learning : 
He could never make me such a fool, 
With all his soft words and fair speaking ; 
Wherefore, &c. 

This minion here, this mincing trull, 2 
Doth please me more a thousand fold, 
Than all the earth that is so full 
Of precious stones, silver and gold ; 
Wherefore, &c. 

Whatsoever I did it was for her sake, 
It was for her love and only pleasure ; 
I count it no labour such labour to take, 
In getting to me so high a treasure. 
Wherefore, &c. 

This day I intended for to be merry, 
Although my hard father be far hence, 
I know no cause for to be heavy, 
For all this cost and great expense. 
Wherefore, &c. 

1 To look sad. 
2 Not a term of reproach.— Cf. 1 Henry VI.— Halliweix. 



42 Songs from the Dramatists. 



ANTHONY MUNDAY. 
1553—1633. 

Anthony Munday, son of Christopher Munday, draper 
of London, was born in 1533, and losing his father at an 
early age, attempted the stage as an actor. It may be pre- 
sumed that the experiment failed, as he afterwards appren- 
ticed himself, in 1576, to one Allde, a stationer. Wearying 
of this occupation, or abandoning it for some other reason, 
he travelled into France and Italy, returning to England in 
or about 1579, and again trying the stage, in a species of 
extemporaneous entertainment, which Mr. Collier conjec- 
tures to have been similar to the Commedie al improviso of 
the Italians. According to a contemporary authority, the 
attempt was unsuccessful. He appears at this time to 
have entered the service of the Earl of Oxford, as one of 
his players, and to have been concerned as an evidence 
against the Soman Catholic priests who were executed at 
Tyburn in 1581. Not long afterwards he was appointed 
one of the messengers of her majesty's chamber, an office 
which he probably held till his death in 1633. 

Munday was a prolific writer, and embraced in the wide 
circuit of his literary labours a remarkable variety of sub- 
jects. Mr. Collier has collected the titles of forty-seven 
works in which he was concerned as author, translator, or 
editor, including poems, tracts, histories, dramas, and 
pageants. Independently of plays of which he was the sole 
author, he wrote several in conjunction with Chettle, Wilson, 
Drayton, Dekker, Middleton, and others ; was amongst the 
cluster of writers in Henslowe's pay, and one of the earliest 
contributors to the stage, in the period immediately pre- 
ceding the era of Shakespeare. 

The play from which the following songs are taken was 
discovered in MS. by Sir Frederic Madden, amongst the 
papers of the Mostyn family, and printed in 1851 by the 
Shakespeare Society, with an elaborate introduction by Mr. 
Collier, rendered still more valuable by the addition of three 



Anthony Munday. 43 

of Munday's tracts against the Jesuits. The title of the 
MS. is The Boole of John a Kent and John a Cumber. The 
structure of the piece fully bears out the character given by 
Meres of Munday as being the 'best plotter.' The action 
is ingeniously contrived ; and, without having recourse to 
artificial expedients, the interest of the story is skilfully 
sustained. 



Jfotm a 2Unt ana #otm a ©umfcer. 



WANTON LOVE. 

7TTHEN wanton love had walked astray, 
*-*"' Then good regard began to chide, 
And meeting her npon the way, 

Says, wanton lass, thou must abide ; 
For I have seen in many years 
That sudden love breeds sullen fears. 

Shall I never, while I live, keep my girl at school ! 
She hath wandered to and fro, 
Further than a maid should go: 

Shall she never, while she lives, make me more a fool. 



LOVE IN PERPLEXITY. 

TN a silent shade, as I sat a sunning, 
J- There I heard a maid grievously complain; 
Many moans she said, amongst her sighs still coming ; 
All was 1 

Then her aged father counselled her the rather 
To consent where he had placed his mind ; 

But her peevish mother brought her to another, 
Though it was against both course and kind. 

1 The passage is thus given in the original. 



44 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Then like a father will I come to check my filly 
For her gadding forth without my leave j 

And if she repent it, I am well contented 
Home again my darling to receive. 

SUNDERED LOVE. 

YOU that seek to sunder love, 
Learn a lesson ere you go 
And as others pains do prove, 

So abide yourselves like woe. 
For I find, and you shall feel 
Self same turn of Fortune's wheel : 
Then if wrong be [so] repaid, 
Say deserved amends it made. 

THE THEFT. 

YOU stole my love ; f y upon you, f y ! 
You stole my love, fy, fy a ; 
Guessed you but what a pain it is to prove, 
You for your love would die a ; 
And henceforth never longer 
Be such a crafty wronger : 
But when deceit takes such a fall, 
Then farewell sly device and all. 
You stole my love ; f y upon you, f y ! 
You stole my love, fy, fy a. 



LEWIS WAGKER. 

15- . 

The Life and Repentance of Mary Magdalen is one of the 
numerous plays of this period founded on scriptural subjects. 
It appears from a passage in the prologue, noticed by Mr. 
Collier, to have been acted by itinerant players at country 
fairs, the spectators bestowing 'half -pence or pence' as 



Lewis Wager. 45 

they thought fit, upon the performers. Another passage 
alludes to its having been represented at the University. 
The play was printed in 1567, and the author is described 
on the title-page as ' the learned clarke Lewis Wager.' 



I&ty 3Ltfe attU 3£Uj)£ntance of i&atg i&ajjoaletu 



MISTRESS MARY. 

1TEY dery dery, with a lusty dery, 

A/ Hoigh Mistress Mary, I pray you be merry. 

Your pretty person we may compare to Lais, 
A morsel for princes and nobler kings ; 
In beauty you excel the fair lady Thais ; 
You exceed the beautiful Helen in all things. 1 
To behold your face who can be weary ? 

Hoigh my Mistress Mary, I pray you be merry. 

The hair of your head shineth as the pure gold, 
Your eyes as glass, and right amiable ; 
Your smiling countenance, so lovely to behold, 
To us all is most pleasant and delectable ; 
Of your commendations who can be weary •? 
Hussa, my Mistress Mary, I pray you be merry. 

Your lips are ruddy as the reddy rose, 

Your teeth as white as ever was the whale's bones ; 

1 The love songs of the period are ing the same date of 1567, there is 

crowded with similar complimen- a song in praise of the Lady Treas- 

tary comparisons. In an interlude ure, containing a verse identical in 

called The Trial of Treasure, hear- substance with the above:— 

Helene may not compared be, 

Nor Cressida that was so bright ; 
These cannot stain the shine of thee, 

Nor yet Minerva of great might. 
Thou passest Venus far away, 

Lady, Lady! 
Love thee I will both night and day, 

My dear Lady ! 



46 Songs from the Dramatists. 

So clear, so sweet, so fair, so good, so fresh, so gay, 
In all Jurie truly at this day there is none. 
With a lusty voice sing we dery dery, 
Hussa, Mistress Mary, I pray you be merry. 




WILLIAM WAGER. 

15— . 

The date of the only piece that bears the name of this 
writer, probably a relation of the preceding, is omitted from 
the title-page of the original edition. But it evidently belongs 
to the early part of the reign of Elizabeth. The snatches 
that follow are sting by Moros, the fool, and are ' foots ' of 
songs, or burthens of well-known ballads, some of which 
are of a much earlier date than the play itself. 

2Tf>e 3Loixser 2Ct)ou 3Libest tfie J&ore jfool 2Tf)0tt &rt* 



FOOTS OF SONGS. 



BROOM, Broom on hill, 
The gentle Broom on hill, hill ; 
Broom, Broom on Hive hill, 
The gentle Broom on Hive hill, 
The Broom stands on Hive hill a. 1 



Robin, lend me thy bow, thy bow, 

Robin the bow, Robin lend to me thy bow a. 



There was a maid came out of Kent, 

Dainty love, dainty love j 
There was a maid came out of Kent, 

Dangerous be [she]. 

1 Mr. Collier observes that this is one of the ballads in Cox's collection, 
and that it is also mentioned by Laneham. 



William Wager. 47 

There was a maid came out of Kent, 
Fair, proper, small and gent, 
As ever upon the ground went, 
For so it should be. 



By a bank as I lay, I lay, 
Musing on things past, hey how. 1 



Tom a Lin and his wife, and his wife's mother, 
They went over a bridge all three together ; 
The bridge was broken and they fell in — 
The devil go with all, quoth Tom a Lin. 2 



Martin Swart and his man, sodle-dum, sodle-dum, 
Martin Swart and his man, sodle-dum bell. 3 



Come over the boorne, Besse, 

My pretty little Besse, 

Come over the boorne, Besse, to me. 4 



The white dove set on the castle wall, 
I bend my bow, and shoot her I shall; 
I put her in my glove, both feathers and all. . 

1 Another of Cox's ballads, also mentioned by Laneham. 

2 There is a popular old Irish Bryan O'Lynn. That it was either 
song, in which the adventures of the same song, or founded on the 
O'Lynn are carried through several same original as the above, will be 
verses. In the Irish version the obvious from the following verse:— 
name of the humorous hero is 

Bryan O'Lynn his wife and wife's mother, 
They all went over a bridge together, 
The bridge it broke and they all fell in, 
The devil go with you, says Bryan O'lynn. 

3 This song, says Mr. Collier, is England and the Queen, on her 
unquestionably as old as Henry coming to the throne, which opens 
VII. Martin Swart was sent over in the same way. It is also one of 
in 1486, by the Duchess of Bur- the ballads of which a scrap is to 
gundy, to assist in the insurrection be found in Shakespeare, sung by 
headed by Lord Lovell. Edgar in King Lear. The form is 

4 The Bessy of the song was Queen common to many popular ditties, 
Elizabeth. Mr. Collier quotes a and appears to have suggested one 
fragment of a dialogue between of Moore's early songs. 



Songs from the Dramatists. 

I laid my bridle upon the shelf, 

If you will any more, sing it yourself. 



I have twenty more songs yet, 

A fond woman to my mother, 

As I were wont in her lap to sit, 

She taught me these, and many other. 

I can sing a song of ' Robin Redbreast,' 

And l My little pretty Nightingale,' 
1 There dwelleth a jolly Foster 1 here by the West,' 
Also, ' I come to drink some of your Christmas ale.' 

When I walk by myself alone, 

It doth me good my songs to render. 



I HAVE a pretty titmouse 
Come pecking on my toe. 
Gossip with you I purpose 
To drink before I go. 
Little pretty nightingale, 
Among the branches green. 
Give us of your Christmas ale, 
In the honour of Saint Stephen. 
Robin Redbreast with his notes 
Singing aloft in the quire, 
Warneth to get you frieze coats, 
For Winter then draweth near. 
My bridle lieth on the shelf, 
If you will have any more, 
Vouchsafe to sing it yourself, 
For here you have all my store. 

1 Forester. 



49 



JOHN LYLY. 

1553 . 

John Lyly, or Lilly, the Euphuist, was born in the Weald 
of Kent, according to Wood, in 1553, but Oldys is inclined 
to think some years earlier. He was a student of Magdalen 
College, Oxford, where he took his degrees, and afterwards 
removed to Cambridge. We next find him at court, where, 
says his first editor, he was thought an excellent poet, and 
was * heard, graced, and rewarded' by the Queen. The 
reward, if any, came slowly; for after several years of 
attendance, expecting and soliciting the appointment of 
Master of the Bevels, he was forced to apply to her 
Majesty at last ' for some little grant to support him in his 
old age.' Of the time or manner of his death nothing is 
known. He was alive in 1597. Few men attained, for a 
short period, so brilliant a reputation. His Anatomy of 
Wit and Euphues, and his England, taught a new English to 
the court and the country, and this language of tropes and 
puerilities became the reigning fashion. 'All our ladies 
were his scholars,' says Sir Henry Blount ; ' and that beauty 
at court who could not parley Euphuism, that is to say, who 
was unable to converse in that pure and reformed English, 
which he had formed his work to be the standard of, was as 
little regarded as she who now there speaks not French.' 
This was written in the reign of Charles I., when the effect 
of the 'pure and reformed English' may be presumed to 
have been obliterated by the interposition of the Scotch 
dialect, and a more learned taste under James I. Lyly's 
' reformed English,' says Drayton, consisted in 

Talking of stones, stars, plants, of fishes, flies, 
Playing with words and idle similies. 

Lyly wrote nine plays, which were very successful, and in 

which his fantastical refinements — especially in his songs, 

which possess considerable grace and delicacy — appear to 

much greater advantage than in his prose treatises. The 

3 



50 Songs from the Dramatists. 

dates of the original editions are attached to each of the 
plays from which the following selections have been made. 



^kxantter ana Campaspe* JSS4* 



CUPID AND CAMPASPE. 

/7UPID and my Campaspe played 

>^ At cards for kisses — Cupid paid ; 

He stakes his quiver, bow and arrows, 

His mother's doves, and team of sparrows ; 

Loses them too ; then down he throws 

The coral of his Up, the rose 

Growing on's cheek (but none knows how), 

With these, the crystal of his brow, 

And then the dimple of his chin ; 

All these did my Campaspe win. 

At last he set her both his eyes, 

She won, and Cupid blind did rise. 

Love ! has she done this to thee ? 

What shall, alas ! become of me! 1 



THE SONGS OP BIRDS. 

7TYHAT bird so sings, yet so does wail ? 
*■*-' 'tis the ravished nightingale. 
' Jug, jug, jug, jug, tereu,' she cries, 
And still her woes at midnight rise. 
Brave prick song ! who is't now we hear ? 
None but the lark so shrill and clear ; 
Now at heaven's gates she claps her wings, 2 
The morn not waking till she sings. 

1 Tliis exquisite little song is printed in Percy's Reliques. 

2 Hark, hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings. 

Shakespeare. 

Ye birds 

That singing up to heaven's gate ascend. 

Milton. 






John Lyly. 51 

Hark, hark, with what a pretty throat, 
Poor robin redbreast tunes his note ; 
Hark how the jolly cuckoos sing, 
Cuckoo to welcome in the spring ! 
Cuckoo to welcome in the spring ! l 



Sap^o aim $t)aon» J5S4- 



vulcan's song. 

mY shag-hair Cyclops, come, let's ply 
Our Lemnian hammers lustily. 
By my wife's sparrows, 
I swear these arrows, 
Shall singing fly 
Through many a wanton's eye. 

These headed are with golden blisses, 
These silver ones feathered with kisses ; 

But this of lead 

Strikes a clown dead, 

When in a dance 

He falls in a trance, 
To see his black-brown lass not buss him, 
And then whines out for death to untruss him. 



COMPLAINT AGAINST LOVE. 

CRUEL Love, on thee I lay 
My curse, which shall strike blind the day ; 
Never may sleep with velvet hand 
Charm these eyes with sacred wand ; 
Thy jailors shall be hopes and fears, 
Thy prison mates groans, sighs, and tears, 
Thy play to wear out weary times, 
Fantastic passions, vows, and rhymes. 

1 An imitation, or rather an alter- amongst the selections from Ford 
ation, of this song occurs in the and Dekker. 
Sun's Darling. It will he found 



52 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Thy bread be frowns, thy drink be gall, 
Such as when yon Phaon call j 
Thy sleep fond dreams, thy dreams long care. 
Hope, like thy fool at thy bed ? s head, 
Mock thee till madness strike thee dead, 
As Phaon thon dost me with thy prond eyes, 
In thee poor Sappho lives, for thee she dies. 

Hntrgmum. 159]. 



A NIGHT CATCH. 

The Pages and the Constables. 
Watch. Q TAND ! who goes there ? 

H^ "We charge yon appear 

'Fore our constable here, 

In the name of the man in the moon. 

To us billmen 1 relate, 

Why you stagger so late, 

And how you came drunk so soon. 
Pages. "What are ye, scabs ? 
Watch. The watch : 

This the constable. 
Pages. A patch. 
Const. Knock 'em down unless they all stand ; 

If any run away, 

'Tis the old watchman's play, 

To reach them a bill of his hand. 
Pages. gentlemen, hold, 

Your gowns freeze with cold, 

And your rotten teeth dance in your head. 

Wine nothing shall cost ye j 

Nor huge fires to roast ye ; 

Then soberly let us be led. 
Const. Come, my brown bills, we'll roar, 

Bounce loud at tavern door. 
Omnes. And in the morning steal all to bed. 

1 The Aratchmen -were so called bill or balbert. Davenant (1636) 
from the pole they carried vrith a tises the term in his play of the 
blade at the top of it, resembling a Wits. 






John Lyly. 53 



SONG OF THE FAIRIES. 

Omnes. IpINCH him, pinch him, black and blue, 
* Saucy mortals must not view 
What the queen of stars is doing, 
Nor pry into our fairy wooing. 

1 Fairy. Pinch him blue — 

2 Fairy. And pinch him black — 

3 Fairy. Let him not lack 

Sharp nails to pinch him blue and red, 
Till sleep has rocked his addlehead. 

4 Fairy \ For the trespass he hath done, 

Spots o'er all his flesh shall run. 
Kiss Endymion, Mss his eyes, 
Then to our midnight heidegyes. ■ 



feiatiiea. J §92. 



CUPID BOUND. 

OYES, yes, if any maid 
Whom leering Cupid has betrayed 
To powers of spite, to eyes of scorn, 
And would in madness now see torn 
The boy in pieces, let her come 
Hither, and lay on him her doom. 

O yes, yes, has any lost 

A heart which many a sigh hath cost ? 

If any cozened of a tear 

Which as a pearl disdain does wear ? 

Here stands the thief j let her but come 

Hither, and lay on him her doom. 

Is any one undone by fire, 
And turned to ashes by desire ? 
Did ever any lady weep, 
Being cheated of her golden sleep 

1 Sports, dances, pastimes. 



54 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Stolen by sick thoughts? — the pirate's found, 
And in her tears he shall be drowned. 
Eead his indictment, let him hear 
"What he's to trust to. Boy, give ear ! 



APOLLO'S SONG OF DAPHNE. 

mY Daphne's hair is twisted gold, 
Bright stars a-piece her eyes do hold, 
My Daphne's brow enthrones the graces, 
My Daphne's beauty stains all faces, 
On Daphne's cheek grow rose and cherry, 
But Daphne's lip a sweeter berry ; 
Daphne's snowy hand but touched does melt, 
And then no heavenlier warmth is felt ; 
My Daphne's voice tunes all the spheres, 
My Daphne's music charms all ears ; 
Fond am I thus to sing her praise, 
These glories now are turned to bays. 

pan's song of syrinx. 

PAN'S Syrinx was a girl indeed, 
Though now she's turned into a reed ; 
From that dear reed Pan's pipe does come, 
A pipe that strikes Apollo dumb ; 
Nor flute, nor lute, nor gittern can 
So chant it as the pipe of Pan : 
Cross-gartered swains and dairy girls, 
With faces smug and round as pearls, 
When Pan's shrill pipe begins to play, 
With dancing wear out night and day 5 
The bagpipe's drone his hum lays by, 
When Pan sounds up his minstrelsy ; 
His minstrelsy, O base ! This quill, 
Which at my mouth with wind I fill, 
Puts me in mind, though her I miss, 
That still my Syrinx' lips I kiss. 



John Lyly. 55 



SONG TO APOLLO. 

OINGr to Apollo, god of day, 

H^ Whose golden beams with morning play, 

And make her eyes so brightly shine, 

Aurora's face is called divine. 

Sing to Phoebus and that throne 

Of diamonds which he sets upon. 
Io Paeans let us sing 
To Physic and to Poesy's king. 

Crown all his altars with bright fire, 
Laurels bind about his lyre, 
A Daphnean coronet for his head, 
The Muses dance about his bed; 
When on his ravishing lute he plays, 
Strew his temple round with bays. 
Io Paeans let us sing 
To the ghttering Delian king. 



jf&otfjer aSomfcte, J59S. 

BACCHANALIAN SONG. 

TO Bacchus ! To thy table 
A Thou callest every drunken rabble ; 
We already are stiff drinkers, 
Then seal us for thy jolly sMnkers. 1 

Wine, O wine ! 

O juice divine ! 
How dost thou the nowle 2 refine. 
Plump thou makest men's ruby faces, 
And from girls can fetch embraces. 
By thee our noses swell 
With sparkling carbuncle. 

1 Tapster, drawer. From skinTc, to draw liquor, to drink. 

2 The noddle, or head— used here to imply the Drain. 



56 Songs from the Dramatists, 

O the dear blood of grapes 
Turns us to antic shapes, 
Now to show tricks like apes, 
Now lion-like to roar, 
Now goatishly to whore, 
Now hoggishly in the mire, 
Now flinging hats in the fire. 
Io Bacchus ! at thy table, 
Make us of thy reeling rabble. 







CUPID. 

CUPID ! monarch over kings, 
Wherefore hast thou feet and wings ? 



Is it to show how swift thou art, 
When thou woundest a tender heart 9 
Thy wings being clipped, and feet held still, 
Thy bow so many could not kill. 

It is all one in Venus' wanton school, 
Who highest sits, the wise man or the fool. 
Fools in love's college 
Have far more knowledge 
To read a woman over, 
Than a neat prating lover : 
Nay, 'tis confessed, 
That fools please women best. 



GEORGE PEELE. 
155- 159-. 
George Peele was a native of Devonshire. His name 
appears in the Matriculation Book of Oxford as a member of 
Broadgates Hall (now Pembroke College) in 1564, and Mr. 
Dyce, assuming him to have been at least twelve or thirteen 
when he was entered, places his birth about 1552 or 1553. 
While he was at the University, Wood tells us that he was 



George Peele. 57 

esteemed a most noted poet. In 1577 he took his Bachelor's 
degree, and was made Master of Arts in 1579, after which 
he went np to London, and became a writer for the theatre. 
There is reason to believe that he appeared occasionally on 
the stage ; but he certainly did not follow it as a profession. 
His intimate associates were Nash, Marlowe, and Greene, the 
most profligate men of genius of the time : and in the latter 
part of his life he was acquainted with Shakespeare, Jonson, 
and their contemporaries, who were coming in at the close 
of his career. Peele appears to have abandoned himself to 
the worst excesses of the town, and to have shortened his 
life by dissipation, if a coarse allusion to him by Francis 
Meres may be credited. The date of his death is unknown ; 
but as Meres' reference to it was printed in 1598, it must 
have taken place in or before that year. He was one of the 
earliest of our poets who imparted form and power to the 
drama, was one of the contributors to the Phoenix Nest, and, in 
addition to numerous small pieces and Pageants, wrote sev- 
eral plays, only five of which have come down to us. Of the 
remainder, few, probably, were printed, and these are sup- 
posed to have been destroyed in the fire of London in 1666. 
Peele holds a place amongst the dramatic poets of that 
period, described by Gilford as the time when ' the chaos of 
ignorance was breaking up,' second only to Marlowe. If his 
versification has not the pomp and grandeur of the ' mighty 
line,' of his great rival, it is sweeter and more melodious ; 
and none of his contemporaries exhibit so much tenderness 
or so luxuriant a fancy. Charles Lamb dismisses his David 
and Bethsdbe as ' stuff ; ' but this hasty judgment is bal- 
anced by the panegyric of Campbell, who speaks of it as 
' the earliest fountain of pathos and harmony that can be 
traced in our dramatic poetry.' What Hazlitt says of the 
literature of the time generally applies to Peele in common 
with the rest : ' I would not be understood to say, that the 
age of Elizabeth was all gold without any alloy. There was 
both gold and lead in it, and often in one and the same 
writer.' There are both in Peele ; but the gold was of the 
finest quality. 
3a 



58 Songs from the Dramatists. 



JLNONE AND PARIS. 

2En. T7AIB- and fair, and twice so fair, 
^ As fair as any may be ; 
The fairest shepherd on onr green, 
A love for any lady. 
Par. Fair and fair, and twice so fair, 
As fair as any may be : 
Thy love is fair for thee alone, 
And for no other lady. 
JUJn. My love is fair, my love is gay, 

As fresh as bin the flowers in May, 
And of my love my roundelay, 

My merry, merry, merry roundelay, 
Concludes with Cupid's curse, 

They that do change old love for new, 
Pray gods, they change for worse ! 
Ambo, simul. They that do change, &c. 
JEn. Fair and fair, &c. 
Par. Fair and fair, &c. 
2En. My love can pipe, my love can sing, 
My love can many a pretty thing, 
And of his lovely praises ring 
My merry, merry roundelays, 

Amen to Cupid's curse, 
They that do change, &c. 

THE SONQ OF THE ENAMOURED SHEPHERD. 

OG-ENTLE Love, ungentle for thy deed, 
Thou makest my heart 
A bloody mark 
"With piercing shot to bleed. 
Shoot soft, sweet Love, for fear thou shoot amiss, 
For fear too keen 
Thy arrows been, 
And hit the heart where my beloved is. 



George Peele. 59 

Too fair that fortune were, nor never I 

Shall be so blest, 

Among the rest, 
That Love shall seize on her by sympathy. 
Then since with Love my prayers bear no boot, 

This doth remain 

To ease my pain, 
I take the wound, and die at Venus' foot. 



^jnone's complaint. 

mELPOMENE, the muse of tragic songs, 
With mournful tunes, in stole of dismal hue, 
Assist a silly nymph to wail her woe, 
And leave thy lusty company behind. 

Thou luckless wreath ! becomes not me to wear 
The poplar tree, for triumph of my love : 
Then as my joy, my pride of love, is left, 
Be thou unclothed of thy lovely green ; 

And in thy leaves my fortunes written be, 
And them some gentle wind let blow abroad, 
That all the world may see how false of love 
False Paris hath to his iEnone been. 



colin's dirge. 

7TYELLADAY, welladay, poor Colin, thou art going 
v*-J to the ground, 

The love whom Thestylis hath slain, 

Hard heart, fair face, fraught with disdain, 
Disdain in love a deadly wound. 

Wound her, sweet love, so deep again, 

That she may feel the dying pain 

Of this unhappy shepherd's swain, 
And die for love as Colin died, as Colin died. 



60 Songs from the Dramatists. 



THE AGED MAN-AT-ARMS. 

I2IS golden locks time hath to silver turned ; 
*-) time too swift, swiftness never ceasing ! 
His youth 'gainst time and age hath ever spurned, 

But spurned in vain ; youth waneth by encreasing 
Beauty, strength, youth, are flowers but fading seen. 
Duty, faith, love, are roots, and ever green. 

His helmet now shall make a hive for bees, 
And lovers' songs be turned to holy psalms ; 

A 'man-at-arms must now serve on his knees, 
And feed on prayers, which are old age's alms : 

But though from court to cottage he depart, 

His saint is sure of his unspotted heart. 

And when he saddest sits in homely cell, 
He'll teach his swains this carol for a song: 

1 Blessed be the hearts that wish my Sovereign well, 
Cursed be the souls that think her any wrong.' 

Goddess, allow this aged man his right, 

To be your beadsman now that was your knight. 

1 A description of a Triumph at in his Specimens from Segur's 
Tilt, held before Queen Elizabeth Honour, Military and Civil (1602), 
in the Tilt Yard at Westminster in and is also given by Beloe, from 
1590. This very rare poem was the Garrick collection in the Brit- 
reprinted by Mr. Dyce, in his edi- ish Museum. Mr. Dyce throws a 
tion of Peele's works, from a copy doubt upon Beloe's veracity, by 
in the University of Edinburgh, stating that he searched in vain for 
amongst the books presented by a copy of Polyhymnia in that col- 
Drummond. The copy was slightly lection ; but Beloe's version was 
mutilated, but the deficiencies were evidently derived, notwithstand- 
supplied from a MS. found in an ing, from the original work, and 
old house in Oxfordshire. The not from Segur's reprint, which 
above song, or sonnet, taken from exhibits several variations. 
Polyhymnia, is extracted by Ellis, 



George Peele. 61 

W$z punting of (ftujiftu 1 ]mt 



QUESTION AND ANSWER. 

mELAMPUS, when will Love be void of fears? 
When Jealousy hath neither eyes nor ears. 
Melampus, when will Love be thoroughly shrieved ? 
When it is hard to speak, and not believed. 
Melampus, when is Love most malcontent ? 
When lovers range, and bear their bows unbent. 
Melampus, tell me when Love takes least harm ? 
When swains' sweet pipes are puffed, and trulls are 

warm. 
Melampus, tell me when is love best fed ? 
When it has sucked the sweet that ease hath bred. 
Melampus, when is time in love ill spent ? 
When it earns meed and yet receives no rent. 
Melampus, when is time well spent in Love ? 
When deeds win meed, and words love works do prove. 

CUPID'S ARROWS. 

AT Venus' entreaty for Cupid her son 
These arrows by Vulcan were cunningly done. 
The first is Love, as here you may behold, 
His feathers, head, and body, are of gold : 
The second shaft is Hate, a foe to love, 
And bitter are his torments for to prove : 
The third is Hope, from whence our comfort springs, 
His feathers [they] are pulled from Fortune's wings : 
Fourth Jealousy in basest minds doth dwell, 
This metal Vulcan's Cyclops sent from hell. 

1 No copy of this work, appar- fragment of the dialogue, were pre- 
ently a sort of dramatic pastoral, is served by Drummond in his corn- 
known to be in existence. These monplace book, and have been 
three songs, two of which are fa- included by Mr. Dyce in his edition 
miliar to the readers of the Helicon of Peele's works, 
and the Parnassus, and a scanty 



62 Songs from the Dramatists. 

LOVE. 

7TYHAT thing is love ?— f or sure love is a thing ; 

**J Love is a prick, love is a sting, 

Love is a pretty, pretty thing j 

Love is a fire, love is a coal, 

Whose flame creeps in at every hole ; 

And, as myself can best devise, 

His dwelling is in ladies' eyes, 

From whence he shoots his dainty darts 

Into the lusty gallants' hearts : 

And ever since was called a god 

That Mars with Venus played even and odd. 



2Tfje #l& fflTOes' Sale* 



THE MAID'S RESOLVE. 

7TYHENAS 1 the rye reach to the chin, 
^*J And chopcherry, chopcherry ripe within, 
Strawberries swimming in the cream, 
And schoolboys playing in the stream ; 
Then 0, then 0, then 0, my true love said, 
'Till that time come again 
She could not live a maid ! 



CELANTE AT THE WELL. 

GENTLY dip, but not too deep, 
For fear you make the golden beard to weep. 
[A head comes up with ears of corn, and 
she counts them in her lap. 

Fair maiden, white and red, 

Comb me smooth, and stroke my head, 

And thou shalt have some cockell-bread. 

Gently dip, but not too deep, 

For fear thou make the golden beard to weep. 

1 When. 



Robert Greene. 63 

Fair maid, white and red, 
Comb me smooth, and stroke my head, 
And every hair a sheaf shall be, 
And every sheaf a golden tree. 

[A head comes up full of gold, and 
she combs it into her lap. 

3Babiti ant) 33eti)sabe, J 599. 



BETHSABE BATHING. 

r^OT sun, cool fire, tempered with sweet air, 
■»■/ Black shade, fair nurse, shadow my white hair: 
Shine, sun ; burn, fire j breathe air, and ease me ; 
Black shade, fair nurse, shroud me, and please me : 
Shadow, my sweet nurse, keep me from burning, 
Make not my glad cause cause of mourning. 

Let not my beauty's fire 

Inflame unstayed desire, 

Nor pierce any bright eye 

That wandereth lightly. 




ROBEET GREENE. 
1560—1592. 
The bulk of Greene's dramatic works, like those of his 
friend Peele, perished in the fire of London, or mouldered 
into dust in the closets of the theatres. Only five of his 
plays have come down to us, and they contain but a single 
song. He shows no lyrical aptitude in his dramatic works ; 
and, being compelled to write for subsistence, he had little 
leisure for cultivating any form of poetry he could not 
accomplish with ease and facility. Assuming him to "be the 
author of this solitary song (the play in which it appears 
was written in conjunction with Lodge), it is an indifferent 
sample of his skill. He wrote better verses (and worse), 
and was capable occasionally of much beauty and neatness. 



64 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Some of his best short pieces will be found in England's 
Helicon. The song may, without much hesitation, be 
ascribed to Greene. It is scarcely worthy of Lodge, whose 
lyrics were generally of a higher and more imaginative 
cast. 

Eobert Greene was a native of Norwich, where he was 
born, according to different accounts, in 1560 or 1550. 
He was educated at St. John's College, Cambridge, and 
took his degrees of A.B. and A.M. in 1578 and 1583. In 
1588 he was incorporated at Oxford. In the interval he 
travelled on the Continent, and is supposed to have described 
some of his adventures in his Groat's Worth of Wit and Never 
too Late. He is said to have taken orders, and there is no 
doubt he studied medicine ; but it is certain he followed 
neither profession. Like Peele, he seems to have appeared 
occasionally on the stage, probably as an amateur in some 
of his own pieces. The confessions he published of his 
career trace a course of almost incredible depravity. Upon 
his return to England, he set up for a man about "town, and 
plunged into the grossest vices of the metropolis. It was 
easier for a man of genius, who loved pleasure and hated 
restraint, to write plays and 'love pamphlets,' than to sit 
down to the sober labours of the pulpit or the hospital; 
and Greene found in this occupation easy, although uncer- 
tain, means of living, and indulging his tastes. Somewhere 
in the country he married a lady of good family, and as 
soon as she had borne him a child, and he had expended her 
portion, he deserted her. The reason he assigns for this 
piece of turpitude is, that she was so virtuous as to 
endeavour to seduce him from his debaucheries. He 
acknowledged that he acted as ill to his friends as to his 
wife, exhausting their good offices, and repaying them with 
ingratitude. The consequence was, that he sank at last 
into the lowest depths of penury and degradation, running 
up scores at alehouses, living precariously by his pen, and 
forsaken by all acquaintances who were able to render him 
any service. The only associates he retained in his dis- 
sipation were Peele, Marlowe, and Nash, and these, as 



Robert Greene. 65 

profligate and unprincipled as himself, abandoned him in 
the end when he most needed their succour. The close of 
his life points a miserable moral. Having indulged in a 
surfeit of pickled herrings and Rhenish wine, he was seized 
with a mortal illness, and, being in the last extremity of 
distress, he must have perished for want of bare necessaries, 
but for the humanity of a poor shoemaker in Dowgate, at 
whose house he died in September, 1592, after lingering 
for a month in mental and bodily pain, deserted by his 
boon companions, and sustained by charity. The debt he 
contracted to this poor man he transferred on his deathbed 
to his wife, whom he had not seen for six years, imploring 
her to discharge it by an appeal to ' the love of their youth !' 
After his death, by Ms own request, his corpse was crowned 
with bays by the shoemaker's wife. 

The deaths of his three intimate friends were no less 
wretched, as far as anything is known of them. Nash, it is 
said, became a penitent ; but Peele hurried himself to the 
grave by dissipation, and Marlowe came by a violent death 
under peculiarly appalling circumstances. 

Greene's writings were very numerous, and, as might be 
expected, very unequal. A full account of them will be 
found in Mr. Dyce's careful and elaborate edition of his 
dramatic works, published in two volumes in 1831. Many 
of them obtained a wide and rapid popularity; and his 
prose writings, abounding in contemporaiy allusions, pos- 
sess, even at the present time, considerable interest for the 
student curious in this kind of lore. 



Hoofems @to» for SLon&on atiO ^tifllanlu J594. 



BEAUTY SUING FOR LOVE. 

BEAUTY, alas ! where wast thou born, 
Thus to hold thyself in scorn ? 
Whenas Beauty Mssed to woo thee, 
Thou by Beauty dost undo me : 
Heigh-ho ! despise me not. 



66 Songs from the Dramatists. 

I and thou in sooth are one, 

Fairer thou, I fairer none : 

Wanton thou, and wilt thou, wanton, 

Yield a cruel heart to plant on ? 

Do me right, and do me reason j 

Cruelty is cursed treason : 

Heigh-ho ! I love, heigh-ho ! I love, 
Heigh-ho ! and yet he eyes me not. 

samela. 1 

LIKE to Diana in her summer weed, 
dirt with a crimson robe of brightest dye, 

Goes fair Samela -, 
Whiter than be the flocks that straggling feed, 
When washed by Arethusa faint they lie, 

Is fair Samela ; 
As fair Aurora in her morning grey, 
Decked with the ruddy glister of her love, 

Is fair Samela ; 
Like lovely Thetis on a calmed day, 
Whenas her brightness Neptune's fancy move, 

Shines fair Samela; 
Her tresses gold, her eyes like glassy streams, 
Her teeth are pearl, 2 the breasts are ivory 

Of fair Samela j 
Her cheeks, like rose and lily yield forth gleams, 
. Her brows' bright arches framed of ebony j 

Thus fair Samela. 

1 This charming song, which, in. its 2 This favourite image is wrought 
structure, will remind the reader of into a delicate and fantastical 
one of Tennyson's popular lyrics, conceit in a song in the Fatal 
is taken from Greene's poems, of Contract, a play by William 
which I should have gladly availed Heminge, the son of Heminge, 
myself more extensively if the plan the actor : 
•of this volume permitted. 

' Who notes her teeth and lips, discloses 

Walls of pearl and gates of roses ; 

Two-leaved doors that lead the way 

Through her breath to Araby, 

To which, would Cupid grant that bliss, 

I'd go a pilgrimage to Mss ! ' 



Thomas Nash. 67 

Passeth fair Venus in her bravest hue, 
And Juno in the shew of majesty, 

For she's Samela : 
Pallas in wit, all three, if you will view, 
For beauty, wit, and matchless dignity 

Yield to Samela. 




THOMAS NASH. 
1564—1601. 

Thomas Nash was born at Lowestoff, in Suffolk, and 
educated at St. John's College, Cambridge, where he took 
his degrees of A.B. and A.M. in 1585 and 1587. The 
date of his birth is not known, but it has been computed, 
from circumstances, to have been 1564, the same year in 
which Shakespeare was born. His London life is sufficiently 
indicated in the notice already given of Peele and Greene. 
If he did not transcend the latter in profligacy, he underwent 
greater vicissitudes of distress and suffering, arising in part 
from the impetuosity of his temperament, which committed 
him to the most reckless excesses, and partly from his 
satirical propensities, which made him many enemies. On 
one occasion he was imprisoned for having written a play 
called the Isle of Dogs, and was several times confined in 
gaol in London. The principal incidents in his literary 
career are his famous paper-war with Gabriel Harvey, con- 
ducted on both sides with savage scurrility ; and his con- 
troversy with Martin Marprelate, in which he espoused the 
cause of the church. He obtained an unenviable notoriety 
by the licentiousness and fierceness of his invectives ; and 
the tract in which he scourges his opponent, Save with you 
to Saffron Walden (the name of Harvey's residence), ran 
through no less than six editions. Notwithstanding the 
coarseness and violence of his controversial pamphlets, and 
the scoffing bitterness of his Pierce Penniless, he had the 
power of writing with grace and energy when he left the 



68 Songs from the Dramatists. 

region of polemics to breathe the purer air of literature. 
He wrote three plays : the tragedy of Dido (in conjunction 
with Marlowe), and two comedies, Summer's Last Will and 
Testament, and the Isle of Bogs, the last never printed, and 
now lost. Towards the close of his life he recanted his 
errors in a pamphlet called Christ's Tears over Jerusalem. 
He died about 1601. 



Summer's 3Last 2TOI attU Sestament j600. 



SPRING. 



CTPRING, the sweet Spring, is the year's pleasant king; 
M' Then blooms each thing, then maids dance in a ring, 
Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing, 
Cuckoo, jug, jug, pu we, to witta woo. 

The palm and may make country houses gay, 
Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day, 
And we hear aye birds tune this merry lay, 
Cuckoo, jug, jug, pu we, to witta woo. 

The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet, 
Young lovers meet, old wives a sunning sit, 
In every street these tunes our ears do greet, 
Cuckoo, jug, jug, pu we, to witta woo. 
Spring, the sweet Spring. 

THE DECAY OF SUMMER. 

FAIR summer droops, droop men and beasts therefore, 
So fair a summer look for never more : 
All good things vanish less than in a day, 
Peace, plenty, pleasure, suddenly decay. 
Go not yet away, bright soul of the sad year, 
The earth is hell when thou leavest to appear. 
What, shall those flowers that decked thy garland erst, 
Upon thy grave be wastefully dispersed ? 



Thomas Nash. 69 

trees consume your sap in sorrow's source, 
Streams turn to tears your tributary course. 
Go not yet hence, bright soul of the sad year, 
The earth is hell when thou leavest to appear. 

THE COMING OF WINTER. 

AUTUMN hath all the summer's fruitful treasure ; 
Gone is our sport, fled is our Croydon's pleasure ! 
Short days, sharp days, long nights come apace : 
Ah, who shall hide us from the winter's face ? 
Cold doth increase, the sickness will not cease, 
And here we He, God knows, with little ease. 

From winter, plague and pestilence, good lord, 
deliver us ! 

London doth mourn, Lambeth is quite forlorn ! 
Trades cry, woe worth that ever they were born ! 
The want of term is town and city's harm ; ] 
Close chambers we do want to keep us warm. 
Long banished must we live from our friends : 
This low-built house will bring us to our ends. 
From winter, plague and pestilence, good lord, 
deliver us ! 

APPROACHING DEATH. 

ADIEU ; farewell earth's bliss, 
This world uncertain is : 
Fond are life's lustful joys, 
Death proves them all but toys. 
None from his darts can fly : 
I am sick, I must die. 

Lord have mercy on us ! 

Rich men trust not in wealth ; 
Gold cannot buy you health ; 

1 This line fixes tlie date of the Term was held at St. Alban's in- 
acting of the play in the Michael- stead of in London. The date 
mas Term of 1598, when, in conse- throws a light on the allusions in 
quence of the plague, Michaelmas the song. 



70 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Physic himself must fade ; 
All things to end are made ; 
The plague full swift goes by ; 
I am sick, I must die. 

Lord have mercy on us ! 

Beauty is but a flower, 
Which wrinkles will devour : 
Brightness falls from the air ; 
Queens have died young and fair 5 
Dust hath closed Helen's eye 5 
I am sick, I must die. 

Lord have mercy on us ! 

Strength stoops unto the grave : 
Worms feed on Hector brave. 
Swords may not fight with fate : 
Earth still holds ope her gate. 
Come, come the hells do cry ; 
I am sick, I must die. 

Lord have mercy on us ! 

Wit with his wantonness, 
Tasteth death's bitterness. 
Hell's executioner 
Hath no ears for to hear 
What vain art can reply ; 
I am sick, I must die. 

Lord have mercy on us ! 

Haste therefore each degree 
To welcome destiny : 
Heaven is our heritage, 
Earth but a player's stage. 
Mount we unto the sky ; 
I am sick, I must die. 

Lord have mercy on us ! 



71 



SAMUEL DANIEL. 

1562—1619. 

Samuel Daniel, the son of a music master, was born near 
Taunton, in Somersetshire, in 1562, and educated at 
Magdalen College, Oxford. Leaving the University at the 
end of three years without taking a degree, he continued to 
prosecute his studies under the patronage of the Countess 
of Pembroke, sister of the accomplished Sidney, whose 
friendship procured for him the appointment of tutor to the 
Lady Anne Clifford, daughter of the Earl of Cumberland. 
His diligent application to literary pursuits enabled him to 
improve these favourable circumstances, and the reputation 
he acquired by the publication of some of his early poems, 
especially the Complaint of Rosamond (in which Mr. Malone 
imagines he has discovered the inspiration of Shakespeare's 
Venus and Adonis) recommended him to the favour of 
royalty. Thus encouraged, he became one of the volun- 
teer laureates of Queen Elizabeth, and under King James 
obtained a place at court as gentleman extraordinary, and 
subsequently as one of the grooms of the privy chamber to 
the Queen Consort, who is said to have entertained a high 
opinion of his conversation and his writings. Few poets 
have been more fortunate in their associations. Daniel 
enjoyed the friendship and respect of his most distinguished 
contemporaries, and amongst those with whom he main- 
tained an intimate intercourse were Camden, Drayton, 
Shakespeare, Jonson, Fulke Greville, Harrington and Spel- 
man ; even Gabriel Harvey paid tribute to his-merits, and 
Spenser transmitted his character to after times in his Colin 
Clout's come home again. While he held his office at court 
(which imposed merely nominal duties upon him) he lived 
in a handsome garden-house in Old-street, St. Luke's ; but 
towards the latter part of his life, feeling that a race of 



72 Songs from the Dramatists. 

greater poets had extinguished his early popularity, or, as 
he expresses it himself, that he had 

outlived, the date 
Of former grace, acceptance, and delight, 

he retired to a farm in Somersetshire, where he died in 
1619. 

In addition to his poems and plays, Daniel wrote a His- 
tory of England, which he carried down to the end of the 
reign of Edward HE. His reputation as a poet rests chiefly 
on the ponderous cantos of the Civil Wars, a poem now 
little read, although it occupies a place of some mark in our 
literature. At the close of his career, when he was relin- 
quishing a Muse that no longer smiled upon his labours, he 
appears to have formed a very accurate estimate of the 
qualities to which he was indebted for his success : — 

And I, although among the latter train, 

And least of those that sung nnto this land, 

Have borne my part, though in an humble strain, 

And pleased the gentler that did understand ; 

And never had my harmless pen at all 

Distained -with any loose immodesty, 

Xor ever noted to be touched with gall, 

To aggravate the worst man's infamy ; 

But still have done the fairest offices 

To virtue and the time.— Dedication of PMlotas. 

The great defect of his poetry is want of imagination, 
which his naturally languid constitution was unable to 
remedy by vigour or boldness of treatment. He always 
writes with good sense ; and his diction, which seldom rises 
above the level of prose, is generally pure and appropriate. 
But his narrative is lifeless and tedious, and fails to sustain 
the attention. He is more successful in his smaller pieces, 
where neatness and delicacy of expression make a distinct 
impression, and atone for the absence of higher qualities. 
It has been said by some of his critics that he anticipated 
the improvements of a more refined age, because he wrote 
with a perspicuity and directness not common amongst his 
contemporaries. But these merits are not in themselves 
sufficient to project a poet beyond his own time ; a truth 
strikingly illustrated in his case. He lived in an age that 



Daniel 73 

produced the noblest examples of English poetry, and he 
has not survived it either in the closet or on the stage. 

His plays are planned strictly on the classical model, 
which he lacked the power to fill up. Deficient in the 
essential of action, and didactic rather than dramatic, they 
are for the most part very flat and dreary. The tragedy of 
Cleopatra, his first play, from which the following piece 
is taken, may, perhaps, be considered the best of them. 



Cleopatra* 1594. 



THE INFLUENCE OP OPINION. 

OPINION, how dost thou molest 
The affected mind of restless man ? 

Who following thee never can, 

Nor ever shall attain to rest, 
For getting what thou sayst is best. 

Yet lo, that best he finds far wide 

Of what thou promisedst before : 

For in the same he looked for more, 

Which proves but small when once 'tis tried. 
Then something else thou findst beside, 

To draw him still from thought to thought : 

When in the end all proves but nought. 

Farther from rest he finds him then, 

Than at the first when he began. 

O malcontent seducing guest, 
Contriver of our greatest woes : 
Which born of wind, and fed with shows, 
Dost nurse thyself in thy unrest j 

Judging ungotten things the best, 
Or what thou in conceit designest ; 
And all things in the world dost deem, 
Not as they are, but as they seem j 
Which shows their state thou ill definest : 

And livest to come, in present pinest. 
4 



74 Songs from the Dramatists. 

For what thou hast, thou still dost lack : 
mind's tormentor, body's wrack, 
Vain promiser of that sweet rest, 
Which never any yet possessed. 

If we unto ambition tend, 
Then dost thou draw our weakness on, 
With vain imagination 
Of that which never had an end. 

Or if that lust we apprehend, 
How dost that pleasant plague infest f 
what strange forms of luxury, 
Thou straight dost cast to entice us by ? 
And tellest us that is ever best 

Which we have never yet possessed. 
And that more pleasure rests beside, 
In something that we have not tried. 
And when the same likewise is had, 
Then all is one, and all is bad. 

This Anthony can say is true, 
And Cleopatra knows 'tis so, 
By the experience of their woe. 
She can say, she never knew 

But that lust found pleasures new, 
And was never satisfied : 
He can say by proof of toil, 
Ambition is a vulture vile, 
That feeds upon the heart of pride, 

And finds no rest when all is tried. 
For worlds cannot confine the one, 
The other, lists and bounds hath none. 
And both subvert the mind, the state, 
Procure destruction, envy, hate. 

And now when all this is proved vain, 
Yet opinion leaves not here, 
But sticks to Cleopatra near, 
Persuading now, how she shall gain 

Honour by death, and fame attain ) 



Dabridgecourt Belchier. 75 

And what a shame it were to live, 
Her kingdom lost, her lover dead : 
And so with this persuasion led, 
Despair doth such a courage give, 
That nought else can her mind relieve, 
Nor yet divert her from that thought: 
To this conclusion all is brought. 
This is that rest this vain world lends, 
To end in death that all things ends. 




DABEIDGECOURT BELCHIEE. 

15— 1621. 

The author of Hans Beer-Pot's Invisible Comedy was a 
Northamptonshire gentleman, who, after completing his 
education at Cambridge and Oxford, settled at Utrecht, 
where he died in 1621. In his dedication to Sir John Ogle, 
governor of the town and garrison of Utrecht, he describes 
the play as being neither comedy nor tragedy, but a plain 
dialogue, or conference, between certain persons, consisting 
of three acts and no more. No division into acts, however, 
appears in the only edition of this curious piece that is 
known to exist. The title-page informs us that it was 
* acted in the Low Countries by an honest company of 
health-drinkers/ and was printed in London in 1618. 
Coxeter speaks of it as a translation [by inference from the 
Dutch] ; but it is distinctly described in the dedication as 
an original production, that cost the author ' not above six- 
teen days' labour.' It is written with considerable humo : :, 
and displays such ease and mastery of versification as to 
occasion regret that he who possessed so quaint and fluent 
a vein should not have given his powers more ample employ- 
ment. 



76 Songs from the Dramatists. 

?£atts aSeer^pot, W Enbtsffile Grome&g ot See Mz attti 
See Jfte Hot J6JS. 



THE CONFESSION. 

7TYALKING in a shady grove, 

U-J Near silver streams fair gliding, 

Where trees in ranks did grace the banks, 

And nymphs had their abiding ; 

Here as I stayed I saw a maid, 

A beauteous lovely creature, 

With angel's face and goddess grace, 

Of such exceeding feature. 

Her looks did so astonish me, 
And set my heart a-quaking, 
Like stag that gazed was I amazed, 
And in a stranger taking. 
Yet roused myself to see this elf, 
And lo a tree did hide me ; 
Where I unseen beheld this queen 
Awhile, ere she espied me. 

Her voice was sweet melodiously, 
She sung in perfect measure ; 
And thus she said with trickling tears ; 
' Alas, my joy, my treasure, 
I'll be thy wife, or lose my life, 
There's no man else shall have me ; 
If God so, I will say no, 
Although a thousand crave me. 

1 Oh ! stay not long, but come, my dear, 
And knit our marriage knot ; 
Each hour a day, each month a year, 
Thou knowest, I think, God wot. 
Delay not then, like worldly maiden, 
Good works till withered age ; 
'Bove other things, the King of kings 
Blessed a lawful marriage. 



Shakespeare. 11 

1 Thou art my choice, I constant am, 

I mean to die unspotted ; 

With thee I'll live, for thee I love, 

And keep my name unblotted. 

A virtuous life in maid and wife, 

The Spirit of God commends it ; 

Accursed he for ever be, 

That seeks with shame to offend it/ 

With that she rose like nimble roe, 
The tender grass scarce bending, 1 
And left me then perplexed with fear 
At this her sonnet's ending. 
I thought to move this dame of love, 
But she was gone already ; 
Wherefore I pray that those that stay 
May find their loves as steady. 



SHAKESPEARE. 1564—1616. 
£too CKentlemen of Verona* 



7TVH0 is Silvia ? What is she, 

*** That all our swains commend her ? 

Holy, fair, and wise is she, 

The heavens such grace did lend her, 
That she might admired be. 

1 Or like a nymph with long dishevelled hair 
Dance on the sands, and yet no footing seen. 

Shakespeake.— Venus and Adonis. 

As falcon to the lure, away she flies ; 

The grass stoops not, she treads on it so light.— Ibid. 

A foot more light, a step more true, 
Ne'er from the heath-flower dashed the dew ; 
E'en the slight harebell raises its head, 
Elastic from her airy tread. 

Scott.— Lady of the Lake. 



78 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Is she kind as she is fair ? 

For beauty lives with kindness : 
Love doth to her eyes repair, 

To help him of his blindness ; 
And, being helped, inhabits there. 

Then to Silvia let ns sing, 
That Silvia is excelling j 

She excels each mortal thing, 
Upon the dull earth dwelling: 

To her let us garlands bring. 



Hobe's Hafcour Host* 



WHITE AND RED. 

IF she be made of white and red, 
Her faults will ne'er be known ; 
For blushing cheeks by faults are bred, 

And fears by pale-white shown ; 
Then, if the fear, or be to blame, 

By this you shall not know ', 
For still her cheeks possess the same, 
Which native she doth own. 1 



THE STUDENT FORSAKES HIS BOOKS FOR LOVE. 

IF love make me forsworn, how shall I swear to love ? 
Ah, never faith could hold, if not to beauty vowed ! 
Though to myself forsworn, to thee I'll faithful prove ; 
These thoughts to me were oaks, to thee like osiers 
bowed. 
Study his bias leaves, and makes his book thine eyes, 
Where all those pleasures live that art would com- 
prehend ) 

1 Own— possess. 



Shakespeare. 79 

If knowledge be the mark, to know thee shall suffice ; 

Well learned is that tongue that will ever thee com- 
mend: 
All ignorant that soul that sees thee without wonder ; 

(Which is to me some praise, that I thy parts admire ;) 
Thine eye Jove's lightning bears, thy voice his dreadful 
thunder, 

Which, not to anger bent, is music, and sweet fire. 
Celestial as thou art, oh pardon, love, this wrong, 
That sings heaven's praise with such an earthly tongue ! 

BEAUTY THROUGH TEARS. 

CT sweet a kiss the golden sun gives not 

H* To those fresh morning drops upon the rose, 

As thine eye-beams, when their fresh rays have smote 

The night of dew that on my cheeks down flows : 
Nor shines the silver moon one half so bright 

Through the transparent bosom of the deep, 
As doth thy face through tears of mine give light : 

Thou shinest in every tear that I do weep ; 
No drop but as a coach doth carry thee, 

So ridest thou triumphing in my woe : 
Do but behold the tears that swell in me, 

And they thy glory through my grief will show : 
But do not love thyself ; then thou wilt keep 
My tears for glasses, and still make me weep. 
queen of queens, how far dost thou excel ! 
No thought can think, nor tongue of mortal tell. 

THE DEFENCE OP PERJURY. 

DID not the heavenly rhetoric of thine eye 
('Gainst whom the world cannot hold argument,) 
Persuade my heart to this false perjury ? 

Vows for thee broke deserve not punishment. 
A woman I forswore ; but, I will prove, 
Thou being a goddess, I forswore not thee : 



80 Songs from the Dramatists. 

My vow was earthly, thou a heavenly love ; 

Thy grace being gained, cures all disgrace in me. 
Vows are but breath, and breath a vapour is : 

Then thou, fair sun, which on my earth dost shine, 
Exhalest this vapour vow ; in thee it is : 

If broken then, it is no fault of mine, 
If by me broke. "What fool is not so wise, 
To lose an oath to win a paradise ? 

FORSWORN FOR LOVE. 

ON a day, (alack the day!) 
Love, whose month is ever May, 
Spied a blossom, passing fair, 
Playing in the wanton air : 
Through the velvet leaves the wind, 
All unseen, 'gan passage find ; 
That the lover, sick to death, 
Wished himself the heaven's breath. 
Air, quoth he, thy cheeks may blow ) 
Air, would I might triumph so ! 
But, alack, my hand is sworn, 
Ne'er to pluck thee from thy thorn : 
Vow, alack, for youth unmeet ; 
Youth so apt to pluck a sweet. 
Do not call it sin in me, 
That I am forsworn for thee : 
Thou for whom Jove would swear, 
Juno but an Ethiope were 5 
And deny himself for Jove, 
Turning mortal for thy love. 

SPRING AND WINTER. 
1 

7TTHEN daisies pied, and violets blue, 
UJ And lady-smocks all silver- white, 
And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue, 
Do paint the meadows with delight, 



Shakespeare. 81 

The cuckoo then, on every tree, 
Mocks married men, for thus sings he, 

Cuckoo ; 
Cuckoo, cuckoo, — O word of fear, 
Unpleasing to a married ear ! 

2 
When shepherds pipe on oaten straws, 

And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks, 
When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, 

And maidens bleach their summer smocks, 
The cuckoo then, on every tree, 
Mocks married men, for thus sings he, 

Cuckoo ; 
Cuckoo, cuckoo, — word of fear, 
Unpleasing to a married ear ! 

3 

When icicles hang by the wall, 
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, 

And Tom bears logs into the hall, 
And milk comes frozen home in pail, 

When blood is nipped, and ways be foul, 

Then nightly sings the staring owl, 
To -who ; 

Tu-whit, to-who, a merry note, 

While greasy Joan doth keel 1 the pot. 

4 
When all around the wind doth blow, 

And coughing drowns the parson's saw, 
And birds sit brooding in the snow, 

And Marian's nose looks red and raw, 
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl, 
Then nightly sings the staring owl, 

To-who ', 
Tu-whit, to-who, a merry note, 
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 

1 Skim. 
4a 



82 Songs from the Dramatists. 

&IV* Well tf>at 25nUs mell. 



ONE GOOD WOMAN IN TEN. 

7TTAS this fair face the cause, quoth she, 
w Why the Grecians sacked Troy ? 
Fond done, done fond, 

"Was this King Priam's joy? 
With that she sighed as she stood, 
With that she sighed as she stood, 

And gave this sentence then : 
Among nine bad if one be good, 
Among nine bad if one be good, 

There's yet one good in ten. 



& ffliOsummex "NigfoVs Bream, 



SONG OF THE FAIRY. 

OVER hill, over dale, 
Thorough bush, thorough brier, 
Over park, over pale, 

Thorough flood, thorough fire, 
I do wander everywhere, 
Swifter than the moon's sphere 5 
And I serve the fairy queen, 
To dew her orbs ■ upon the green j 
The cowslips tall her pensioners be ; 
In their gold coats spots you see, 
These be rubies, fairy favours, 
In those freckles live their savours : 
I must go seek some dewdrops here, 
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear. 

1 The rings on the sward, dried up by the feet of the fairies in dancing 
their rounds. 



Shakespeare. 83 



TITANIA IN THE WOOD. 
1 

YOU spotted snakes, with, double tongue, 
Thorny hedge-hogs, be not seen j 
Newts, and blind-worms, do no wrong ; 
Come not near our fairy queen : 

Chorus. 

Philomel, with melody, 
Sing in our sweet lullaby ; 
Lulla, lulla, lullaby ; lulla, lulla, lullaby ; 
Never harm, nor spell nor charm, 
Come our lonely lady nigh j 
So, good night, with lullaby. 

2 
Weaving spiders, come not here : 

Hence, you long-legged spinners, hence : 
Beetles black, approach not near ; 

Worm, nor snail, do no offence. 

Chorus. 
Philomel, with melody, &c. 



BIRDS. 

7M3E woosel-cock, 1 so black of hue, 
^ With orange-tawny bill, 
The throstle with his note so true, 

The wren with little quill ; 
The finch, the sparrow, and the lark, 

The plain-song cuckoo gray, 
Whose note full many a man doth mark, 

And dares not answer, nay. 

1 The blackbird. 



84 Songs from the Dramatists. 



THE DEAD OF THE NIGHT — THE APPROACH OP THE FAIRIES. 

DOW the hungry lion roars, 
And the wolf behowls the moon ) 
Whilst the heavy ploughman snores, 

All with weary task fordone. 
Now the wasted brands do glow, 

Whilst the scritch-owl, scritching loud, 
Puts the wretch that lies in woe, 

In remembrance of a shroud. 
Now it is the time of night 

That the graves, all gaping wide, 
Everyone lets forth his sprite, 

In the churchway paths to glide : 
And we fairies, that do run 

By the triple Hecate's team, 
From the presence of the sun, 

Following darkness like a dream, 
Now are frolic ; not a mouse 
Shall disturb this hallowed house : 
I am sent with broom before, 
To sweep the dust behind the door. 

Through the house give glimmering light, 

By the dead and drowsy fire ; 
Every elf, and fairy sprite, 

Hop as light as bird from brier ; 
And this ditty after me, 
Sing, and dance it, trippingly. 
First, rehearse this song by rote 5 
To each word a warbling note, 
Hand in hand, with fairy grace, 
We will sing, and bless this place. 



Now, until the break of day, 
Through this house each fairy stray. 



Shakespeare. 85 

To the best bride-bed will we, 

Which by us shall blessed be 3 

And the issue there create 

Ever shall be fortunate. 

So shall all the couples three 

Ever true in loving be ; 

And the blots of nature's hand 

Shall not in their issue stand ; 

Never mole, hare-lip, nor scar, 

Nor mark prodigious, such as are 

Despised in nativity, 

Shall upon their children be. 

With this field-dew consecrate, 

Every fairy take his gait j 

And each several chamber bless, 

Through this palace with sweet peace : 

Ever shall in safety rest, 

And the owner of it blessed. 

Trip away ; 

Make no stay : 
Meet me all by break of day. 

|&eref)ant of Venice* 



THE BIRTH AND DEATH OF FANCY. 1 

T^ELL me where is fancy bred, 
^ Or in the heart, or in the head ? 
How begot, how nourished H 
Reply, reply. 

It is engendered in the eyes, 
With gazing fed 5 and fancy dies 
In the cradle where it lies : 
Let us all ring fancy's knell ; 
I'll begin it, — Ding, dong, bell. 
Ding, dong, bell. 

1 Fancy is constantly used by Shakespeare and his contemporaries : 
the sense of love. 



86 Songs from the Dramatists. 



THE CHOICE. 

Gold. 

JT LL that glisters is not gold, 
"• Often have you heard that told } 
Many a man his life hath sold 
But my outside to behold ; 
Gilded tombs do worms infold. 
Had you been as wise as bold, 
Young in limbs, in judgment old, 
Your answer had not been inscrolled ; 
Fare you well ; your suit is cold. 

Silver. 

The fire seven times tried this ; 
Seven times tried that judgment is 
That did never choose amiss : 
Some there be that shadows kiss; 
Such have but a shadow's bliss ; 
There be fools alive, I wis, 
Silvered o'er ; and so was this. 
Take what wife you will to bed, 
I will ever be your head : 
So begone : you are sped. 

Lead. 

You that choose not by the view, 
Chance as fair, and choose as true ! 
Since this fortune falls to you, 
Be content, and seek no new. 
If you be well pleased with this, 
And hold your fortune for your bliss, 
Turn you where your lady is, 
And claim her with a loving kiss. 



Shakespeare. 87 

l&itct) &&o gfoout Nothing* 



INCONSTANCY OF MEN. 

1 

CT IGH no more, ladies, sigh no more ; 
M^ Men were deceivers ever ; 
One foot in sea, and one on shore ; 
To one thing constant never : 
Then sigh not so, 
Bnt let them go, 
And be yon blithe and bonny ; 
Converting all your sounds of woe 
Into, hey nonny, nonny. 

2 
Sing no more ditties, sing no mo 

Of dumps so dull and heavy ; 
The fraud of men was ever so, 
Since summer first was leavy, 

Then sigh not so, &c. 

hero's epitaph. 

DONE to death by slanderous tongues 
Was the Hero that here lies ; 
Death, in guerdon of her wrongs, 

Gives her fame which never dies : 
So the life that died with shame, 
Lives in death with glorious fame. 
Hang thou there upon the tomb, 
Praising her when I am dumb. 

HYMN AT THE TOMB. 

PARDON, goddess of the night, 
Those that slew thy virgin knight ; 
For the which, with songs of woe, 
Round about her tomb they go. 



88 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Midnight, assist our moan; 
Help us to sigh and groan, 
Heavily, heavily : 
Graves yawn, and yield your dead, 
Till death be uttered, 
Heavenly, heavenly. 



i&errg fflTOea of SSJitttrsor* 



F 



A ' SCORNFUL RHYME.' 

1 Y on sinful fantasy ! 
Fy on lust and luxury ! 
Lust is but a bloody fire, 
Kindled with unchaste desire, 
Fed in heart ; whose flames aspire, 
As thoughts do blow them, higher and higher. 
Pinch him, fairies, mutually 5 
Pinch him for his villainy ; 
Pinch him, and burn him, and turn him about, 
Till candles, and star-light, and moon-shine be out. 



StoetftJ) Ntstit. 



SWEET-AND-TWENTY. 

MISTRESS mine, where are you roaming? 
0, stay and hear ) your true love's coming, 
That can sing both high and low: 
Trip no further, pretty sweeting j 
Journeys end in lovers' meeting, 
Every wise man's son doth know. 

What is love ? 'tis not hereafter ; 
Present mirth hath present laughter ; 

What's to come is still unsure : 
In delay there lies no plenty ; 
Then come Mss me, sweet-and-twenty, 

Youth's a stuff will not endure. 



Shakespeare. 89 

SLAIN BY LOVE. 

/70ME away, come away, death, 
V And in sad cypress let me be laid ; 
Fly away, fly away, breath ; 
I am slain by a fair cruel maid. 
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew, 

0, prepare it; 
My part of death no one so true 
Did share it. 

Not a flower, not a flower sweet, 
On my black coffin let there be strown ; 

Not a friend, not a friend greet 
My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown : 
A thousand thousand sighs to save, 

Lay me, where 
Sad true lover never find my grave, 
To weep there. 

THE CLOWN'S EXIT. 

I AM gone, Sir, 
And anon, Sir, 
I'll be with you again, 
In a trice, 

Like to the old Vice, 
Your need to sustain ; 

Who with dagger of lath, 
In his rage and his wrath, 

Cries, ah, ha ! to the devil : 
Like a mad lad, 
Pare thy nails, dad, 

Adieu, goodman drivel. 

THE RAIN IT RAINETH EVERY DAY. 

7TYHEN that I was and a little tiny boy, 
^■W With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 
A foolish thing was but a toy, 
For the rain it raineth every day. 



90 Songs from the Dramatists. 

But when I came to man's estate, 
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 

'Gainst knave and thief men shut their gate, 
For the rain it raineth every day. 

But when I came, alas ! to wive, 
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 

By swaggering could I never thrive, 
For the rain it raineth every day. 

But when I came unto my bed, 
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 

With toss-pots still had drunken head, 
For the rain it raineth every day. 

A great while ago the world begun, 
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 

But that's all one, our play is done, 
And we'll strive to please you every day. 1 



&s 3Tou fttfce Kt, 



UNDER THE GREENWOOD TREE. 

UNDER the greenwood tree, 
Who loves to he with me, 
And tune 2 his merry note 
Unto the sweet bird's throat, 
Come hither, come hither, come hither ; 
Here shall we see 
No enemy 
But winter and rough weather. 

I The Fool in King Lear sings a snatch of a ballad with the same 
Durthen :— 

' He that has and a little tiny wit, 

With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 

Mnst make content with his fortunes fit, 

Though the rain it raineth every day.' 

2 In some editions turn. 



Shakespeare. 91 

ambition shun, 
And loves to live in the sun. 



Who doth ambition shun, 



Seeking the food he eats, 
And pleased with what he gets, 
Come hither, come hither, come hither $ 
Here shall he see 
No enemy, 
But winter and rough weather. 

If it do come to pass, 
That any man turn ass, 
Leaving his wealth and ease, 
A stubborn will to please, 
Ducdame, ducdame, ducdame $ 
Here shall he see, 
Gross fools as he, 
An if he will come to me. 



INGRATITUDE. 

BLOW, blow, thou winter wind, 
Thou art not so unkind 
As man's ingratitude ; 
Thy tooth is not so Ijeen, 
Because thou art not seen, 
Although thy breath be rude. 
Heigh ho ! sing, heigh ho ! unto the green holly : 
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly 
Then, heigh ho ! the holly ! 
This life is most jolly. 

Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky, 
Thou dost not bite so nigh 

As benefits forgot : 
Though thou the waters warp, 1 
Thy sting is not so sharp 

As friend remembered not. 
Heigh ho ! sing heigh ho ! &c. 

1 There was an old Saxon proverb, Winter shall warp water. 



92 Songs from the Dramatists, 

ROSALIND. 

FROM the east to western Ind, 
No jewel is tike Rosalind. 
Her worth, being mounted on the wind, 
Through all the world bears Rosalind. 
All the pictures, fairest lined, 
Are but black to Rosalind. 
Let no face be kept in mind, 
But the fair 1 of Rosalind. 
If a hart do lack a hind, 
Let him seek out Rosalind. 
If the cat will after kind, 
So, be sure, will Rosalind. 
Winter garments must be lined, 
So must slender Rosalind. 
They that reap must sheaf and bind $ 
Then to cart with Rosalind. 
Sweetest nut hath sourest rind, 
Such a nut is Rosalind. 
He that sweetest rose will find, 
Must find love's prick and Rosalind. 

THE HOMILY OF LOVE. 

JHY should this desert silent be ? 
For it is unpeopled ? No ; 
Tongues I'll hang on every tree, 
That shall civil sayings shew. 
Some, how brief the life of man 

Runs his erring pilgrimage ; 
That the stretching of a span 
Buckles in his sum of age. 
Some, of violated vows 

'Twixt the souls of friend and friend : 
But upon the fairest boughs, 
Or at every sentence' end, 

l Used for fairness, or beauty. 



Shakespeare. 93 

Will I Rosalinda write : 

Teaching all that read to know 
The quintessence of every sprite 

Heaven would in little show. 
Therefore heaven nature charged 

That one body should be filled 
With all graces wide enlarged : 

Nature presently distilled 
Helen's cheek, but not her heart ; 

Cleopatra's majesty ; 
Atalanta's better part ; 

Sad Lucretia's modesty. 
Thus Eosalind of many parts 

By heavenly synod was devised ; 
Of many faces, eyes, and hearts, 

To have the touches dearest prized. 
Heaven would that she these gifts should have, 
And I to live and die her slave. 

THE DEATH OF THE DEER. 

7TYHAT shall he have that killed the deer ? 
**" His leather skin, and horns to wear. 
Take thou no scorn, to wear the horn ; 
It was a crest ere thou wast born. 

Thy father's father wore it ; 

And thy father bore it : 
The horn, the horn, the lusty horn, 
Is not a thing to laugh to scorn. 

THE MESSAGE OF HOPELESS LOVE. 

7T RT thou god to shepherd turned, 
-**- That a maiden's heart hath burned ? 
Why, thy godhead laid apart, 
Warrest thou with a woman's heart ? 
Whiles the eye of man did woo me, 
That could do no vengeance to me. 



94 Songs from the Dramatists. 

If the scorn of your bright eyne 
Have power to raise such love in mine, 
Alack, in me what strange effect 
Would they work in mild aspect ? 
Whiles you chid me, I did love ; , 
How then might your prayers move ? 
He that brings this love to thee, 
Little knows this love in me : 
And by him seal up thy mind ; 
Whether that by youth and kind 
WiU the faithful offer take 
Of me, and all that I can make ; 
Or else by him my love deny, 
And then I'll study how to die. 



LOVERS LOVE THE SPRING. 

TT was a lover and his lass, 

* With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino 

That o'er the green corn-field did pass 

In the spring time, the only pretty ring time, 
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding ; 
Sweet lovers love the spring. 

Between the acres of the rye, 

With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, 
These pretty country folks would lie, 

In spring time, &c. 

This carol they began that hour, 
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, 

How that a life was but a flower 
In spring time, &c. 

And therefore take the present time, 
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino, 

For love is crowned with the prime, 
In spring time, &c. 



Shahespeare. 95 



THE BETEOTHAL. 

THEN is there mirth in heaven, 
When earthly things made even 
Atone together. 
Good duke, receive thy daughter, 
Hymen from heaven brought her, 

Yea, brought her hither ; 
That thou mightst join her hand with his, 
Whose heart within her bosom is. 



WEDLOCK. 

7TYEDDING is great Juno's crown ; 
*** O blessed bond of board and bed ! 
'Tis Hymen peoples every town; 

High wedlock then be honoured : 
Honour, high honour and renown, 
To Hymen, god of every town ! 



ftteasure for Measure. 



TAKE, OH! TAKE THOSE LIPS AWAY. 

TAKE, oh ! take those lips away, 
That so sweetly were forsworn ; 
And those eyes, the break of day, 

Lights that do mislead the morn : 
But my kisses bring again, 

Bring again. 
Seals of love, but sealed in vain, 

Sealed in vain. 1 

1 The music of this song was Shakespeare Society Papers, il. 33.] 

composed by ' Jack Wilson,' the Shakespeare's claim to the words 

singer, who belonged to the same is doubtful. The same song, with 

company of players with Shake- an additional stanza, appears in 

speare, and whose name is given in Beaumont and Fletcher's play of 

a stage direction in Much Ado Mollo, Duke of Normandy, under 

about Nothing, 4to, 1600. [See which head they will be found in 

communication from Mr. Collier, the present volume. Mr. Collier 



96 Songs from the Dramatists. 



& Winter's 2Tale» 



THE SWEET OF THE YEAR. 

7TTHEN daffodils begin to peer, 
^*J With heigh ! the doxy over the dale, 
"Why, then comes in the sweet o' the year; 
For the red blood reigns in the winter's pale. 

The white sheet bleaching on the hedge, 
With heigh ! the sweet birds, 0, how they sing ! 

Doth set thy pugging 1 tooth on edge ; 
For a quart of ale is a dish for a king. 

The lark, that tirra-lirra chants, 

With heigh! with hey ! the thrush and the jay : 
Are summer songs for me and my aunts, 

While we lie tumbling in the hay. 

But shall I go mourn for that, my dear? 

The pale moon shines by night : 
And when I wander here and there, 

I then do most go right. 

If tinkers may have leave to live, 

And bear the sow-skin bowget j 
Then my account I well may give, 

And in the stocks avouch it. 

observes, on the other hand, that Into his plays (with the exception 

both stanzas are ascribed to Shake- of scraps and foots of popular bal- 

speare in the edition of his poems lads) any songs by other writers, 

printed in 8vo, 1640. But it should This is the only instance upon 

be observed also that the song is which a doubt can be raised, 

not given in the earlier edition by 1 Supposed to mean thieving, 

Juggard, and that the edition of from the old word puggard, a thief . 

1640 is not conclusive authority. The close resemblance suggests the 

Thebestevidenceinfavour of Shake- derivation from this word # of the 

speare's authorship is the general flash term prigging or proguing, 

fact that, unlike most of the old which, however, is rejected by Dr. 

dramatists, he never introduced Nares. 



Shakespeare. 97 



A MERRY HEART FOR THE ROAD. 

JOG on, jog on, the footpath way, 
And merrily hent 1 the stile-a : 
A merry heart goes all the day, 
Your sad tires in a mile-a. 



THE PEDLAR AT THE DOOR. 

LAWN, as white as driven snow ; 
Cypress, black as e'er was crow ; 
Gloves, as sweet as damask roses ; 
Masks for faces, and for noses ; 
Bugle-bracelet, necklace-amber, 
Perfume for a lady's chamber : 
Golden quoifs and stomachers, 
For my lads to give their dears ; 
Pins and poking-sticks of steel, 2 
What maids lack from head to heel : 
Come, buy of me, come ; come buy, come buy; 
Buy, lads, or else your lasses cry : 

Come, buy, &c. 

THE BALLAD OP TWO MAIDS WOOING A MAN. 

A, i^ET you hence, for I must go ; 
>3 Where it fits not you to know. 

D. Whither? M. 0, whither f D. Whither"? 
M. It becomes thy oath full well, 
Thou to me thy secrets tell : 

D. Me too, let me go thither. 
M. Or thou goest to the grange, or mill : 

B. If to either, thou dost ill. 

1 To seize, to hold. 

2 A small stick used for setting be used hot. The steel poking-stick 

the plaits of ruffs. They were was introduced in the reign of 

originally made of wood or bone, Elizabeth, 
afterwards of steel that they might 

5 



98 Songs from the Dramatists. 

A. Neither. D. What neither? A. Neither. 
_D. Thou hast sworn my love to be : 
M . Thou hast sworn it more to me : 

Then, whither goest ? Say, whither H 

THE PEDLAR'S PACK. 

7TVILL you buy any tape, 

^** Or lace for your cape, 
My dainty duck, my dear-a ? 

Any silk, any thread, 

Any toys for your head, 
Of the new'st, and fin'st, fin'st wear-a ? 

Come to the pedlar ; 

Money's a medler, 
That doth utter all men's ware-a. 

8tf>e HtvatytnU 



MUSIC IN THE AIR. 

/70ME unto these yellow sands, 

V^ And then take hands : 

Courtesied when you have, and kissed, 

The wild waves whist, 
Foot it f eatly here and there ; 
And, sweet sprites, the burden bear. 

Hark, hark ! 
Bowgh, wowgh. 

The watch-dogs bark : 
Bowgh, wowgh. 

Hark, hark ! I hear 
The strain of strutting chanticleer 
Cry, Cock-a-doodle-doo. 

THE DROWNED FATHER. 

TTULL fathom five thy father lies : 
™ Of his bones are coral made ; 
Those are pearls that were his eyes : 
Nothing of him that doth fade, 



Shakespeare. 99 

But doth suffer a sea-change 
Into something rich and strange, 
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell : 
Hark ! now I hear them, — ding-dong, bell. ■ 



THE WARNING. 

7TVHILE you here do snoring lie, 
^** Open-eyed Conspiracy 

His time doth take ,• 
If of life you keep a care, 
Shake off slumber, and beware : 

Awake ! awake ! 



a sailor's aversion. 

CHE master, the swabber, the boatswain, and I, 
The gunner and his mate, 
Loved Mall, Meg, and Marian, and Margery, 
But none of us cared for Kate ; 
For she had a tongue with a tang, 
Would cry to a sailor, ( Go hang;' 
She loved not the savour of tar nor of pitch, 
Yet a tailor might scratch her where'er she did itch ; 
Then to sea, boys, and let her go hang. 



THE BLESSING OP JUNO AND CERES. 

"E20N0UR, riches, marriage-blessing, 
*-) Long continuance, and encreasing, 
Hourly joys be still upon you ! 
Juno sings her blessings on you. 

Earth's increase, andfoison 2 plenty, 
Barns and garners never empty ; 
Vines with clustering bunches growing j 
Plants with goodly burthen bowing ; 

1 Set to music by Robert Johnson, 1612. 2 Abundance. 



100 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Spring come to you, at the farthest, 
In the very end of harvest ! 
Scarcity and want shall shun you; 
Ceres' blessing so is on you. 



ARIEL SET FREE. 

7TYHERE the bee sucks, there suck I ; 

*JJ In a cowslip's bell I He ; 

There I couch when owls do cry ; 

On the bat's back I do fly 

After summer merrily : 

Merrily, merrily, shall I live now, 

Under the blossom that hangs on the bough. 



Hm3 3^enrg £17. $art ££♦ 

BE MERRY, BE MERRY. 

"T\0 nothing but eat, and make good cheer, 
U And praise Heaven for the merry year ; 
When flesh is cheap and females dear, 
And lusty lads roam here and there, 
| So merrily, 
And ever among so merrily. 

Be merry, be merry, my wife has all, 
For women are shrews, both short and tall ; 
'Tis merry in hall when beards wag all, 
And welcome merry shrove-tide. 

Be merry, be merry, &c. 

A cup of wine that's brisk and fine, 
And drink unto the leman mine ; 

And a merry heart lives long-a. 
Fill the cup, and let it come, 
I'll pledge you a mile to the bottom. 

1 Robert Johnson also composed the music of this song. 



Shakespeare. 101 



FRAGMENTS OF BALLADS. 
1 

KNOCKS go and come 
To all and some 
God's vassals feel the same, 
And sword and shield 
In bloody field 
Do win immortal fame. 

2 
If wishes would prevail with me, 
My purpose should not fail with me, 
But thither would I now j 
And as duly, 
But not as truly, 
As bird doth sing on bough. ■ 



Bitifl ^enrg UEE5L 



INFLUENCE OF MUSIC. 

ORPHEUS with his lute made trees, 
And the mountain-tops that freeze, 
Bow themselves, when he did sing : 
To his music, plants and flowers, 
Ever sprung ; as sun, and showers 
There had made a lasting spring. 

1 These fragments of ballads, mediately follow, thrown into verse 

sung by Pistol and the Boy (Act iii. by the emendator. In the third line 

Sc. 2), are taken in the form in of the second stanza the word Me, 

which they are here given from the as printed in all the copies, is 

curious volume of MS. Notes and changed, with obvious propriety, 

Emendations on the Folio of 1632, into now. A comparison between 

published by Mr. Collier. In all the verses as they are given above, 

existing editions of Shakespeare and as they are printed in the play, 

the first line of the first stanza will enable the reader to trace the 

forms part of the dialogue, and it is variances, 
here, with the two lines that im- 



102 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Everything that heard him play, 
Even the billows of the sea, 

Hung their heads, and then lay by — 
In sweet music is such art: 
Killing care, and grief of heart, 

Fall asleep, or, hearing, die. 



OPHELIA'S SONGS. 

1 
TDOW should I your true love know 
■*•/ From another one ? 
By his cockle hat and staff, 
And his sandal shoon. 

He is dead and gone, lady, 

He is dead and gone ; 
At his head a grass-green turf, 

At his heels a stone. 

White his shroud as the mountain snow, 
Larded all with sweet flowers, 

Which bewept to the grave did go, 
With true-love showers. 

2 

GOOD morrow, 'tis Saint Valentine's day, 
All in the morning betime, 
And I a maid at your window, 
To be your Valentine. 

Then up he rose, and donned his clothes, 
And dupped 1 the chamber door; 

Let in the maid, that out a maid 
Never departed more. 

1 To do open, abbreviated into kind of half-door swinging on two 

dup, or do up. The meaning is ex- hinges at the top, which is still 

plained by Dr. Nares : — ' Some seen in some shops.'— Glossary. It 

gates and doors were opened by also applies to doors with latches, 
lifting np as port-cullises, and that 



Shakespeare. 103 

By Gis, and by Saint Charity, 

Alack, and fy for shame ! 
Young men will do it, if they come to it 5 

By cock, they are to blame. 

Quoth she, before you tumbled me, 

You promised me to wed : 
So would I ha' done, by yonder sun, 

An thou hadst not come to my bed. 



A : 



3 

ND will he not come again ? 
And will he not come again ? 



No, no, he is dead, 



Go to thy death-bed, 
He never will come again. 

His beard was as white as snow 

All flaxen was his poll : 
He is gone, he is gone, 
And we cast away moan ; 

God 'a' mercy on his soul ! 



grave-digger's song. 1 

IN youth when I did love, did love, 
Methought, it was very sweet, 
To contract, 0, the time, for, ah ! my behove 
O, methought, there was nothing meet. 

1 These stanzas are from the appears to have altered the verses 

poem of The Aged Lover renounceth to suit them the better to the char- 

Zove, written by Lord Vaux.— See acter of the grave-digger ; unless 

Surrey's Poems [Ann. Ed. p. 226]. we are to suppose that corruptions 

In Shakespeare' s time Lord Vaux's had crept into the broad-sheet, 

poem was one of the popular bal- The following are the original 

lads of the day, and Shakespeare stanzas:— 

' I loathe that I did love 

In youth that I thought sweet, 
As time requires for my behove, 

Methinks they are not meet. 



104 Songs from the Dramatists. 

But age, with, his stealing steps, 
Hath clawed me in his clutch, 

And hath shipped me intil the land, 
As if I had never been such. 

A pickaxe, and a spade, a spade, 
For — and a shrouding sheet : 

O, a pit of clay for to be made 
For such a guest is meet. 



lR$mMine+ 



SERENADE. 

p^ ARK ! hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings, 

*/ And Phoebus 'gins arise, 

His steeds to water at those springs 

On chaliced flowers that lies ; 
And winking Mary-buds begin 

To ope their golden eyes ; 
With every thing that pretty bin t 1 

My lady sweet, arise ', 
Arise, arise. 

THE DIRGE OF IMOGEN. 

FEAR no more the heat o' the sun 
Nor the furious winter's rages ; 
Thou thy worldly task hast done, 

Home art gone and ta'en thy wages : 
Golden lads and girls all must, 
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. 

For Age with stealing steps 

"Hath clawed me with his clutch, 
And lusty Life away she leaps 

As there had heen none such. 

A pick-axe and a spade, 

And eke a shrouding sheet, 
A house of clay for to he made 

For such a guest most meet.' 

1 Printed is in the folio, changed by Hanmer to bin. 



Shakespeare. 105 

Fear no more the frown o' the great, 
Thou art past the tyrant's stroke j 

Care no more to clothe, and eat ; 
To thee the reed is as the oak : 

The sceptre, learning, physic, must 

All follow this, and come to dust. 

Fear no more the lightning-flash, 
Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone. 

Fear not slander, censure rash; 
Thou hast finished joy and moan : 

All lovers young, all lovers must 

Consign to thee, and come to dust. 

No exorciser harm thee ! 
Nor no witchcraft charm thee ! 
Ghost unlaid forbear thee ! 
Nothing ill come near thee ! 

Quiet consummation have ; 

And renowned be thy grave ! 



©tfjello. 



KING STEPHEN". 

KING Stephen was a worthy peer, 
His breeches cost him but a crown; 
He held them sixpence all too dear, 
With that he called the tailor lown. 

He was a wight of high renown, 

And thou art but of low degree : 
'Tis pride that pulls the country down, 

Then tak thy auld cloak about thee. 1 

1 An English version of the old these stanzas are taken "will be 
ballad (supposed to have been found in Percy's Beliques, i. 153, 
originally Scotch) from which ed. 1844. 

5a 



106 Songs from the Dramatists. 



THE WILLOW SONG. 

THE poor soul sat singing by a sycamore tree, 
Sing all a green willow ; 
Her hand on her bosom, her head on her knee, 

Sing willow, willow, willow : 
The fresh streams ran by her, and murmiired her moans ; 
Her salt tears fell from her, and softened the stones j 
Sing willow, willow, willow ; 
Sing all a green willow must be my garland. 1 



Ifcinjj 3Ltzv. 



THE FOOL'S SONG. 

FOOLS had ne'er less grace in a year; 
For wise men are grown foppish ; 
And know not how their wits to wear, 
Their manners are so apish. 

Then they for sudden joy did weep, 

And I for sorrow sung, 
That such a king should play bo-peep, 

And go the fool among. 

1 This is the opening verse of an lover. The following are the words 
old ballad adapted to Desdemona of the original :— 
by changing the sex of the forsaken 

' A poor soul sat sighing nnder a sycamore tree ; 

* O willow, willow, willow ! ' 
With his hand on his bosom, his head on his knee ; 

' O willow, willow, willow ! 
O willow, willow, willow ! 
Sing, O the green willow shall be my garland.' ' 

The whole ballad is given from a Reliques, i. 156. For the first 
black-letter copy in the Pepys' Willow Song, see ante, p. 25. 
Collection by Bishop Percy.— 



Shakespeare. 107 

l&acbeti), 

THE WITCHES' RENDEZVOUS. 

1 Witch. 7TYHEN shall we three meet again, 

^*J In thunder, lightning, or in rain ? 

2 Witch. When the hurlyburly's done, 

When the battle's lost and won : 

3 Witch. That will be ere set of sun. 

1 Witch. Where the place % 

2 Witch. Upon the heath ; 

3 Witch. There to meet with Macbeth. 
1 Witch. I come, Grimalkin ! l 

All. Paddock 2 calls : — Anon. — 
Fair is foul, and foul is fair ; 
Hover through the fog and filthy air. 



THE CHARM. 

1 Witch. T^HRICE the brinded 3 cat hath mewed. 

2 Witch. ^ Thrice j and once the hedgehog whined. 

3 Witch. Harpier cries : — 'Tis time, 'tis time. 

1 Witch. Round about the caldron go : 

In the poisoned entrails throw. 
Toad, that under cold stone, 
Days and nights hath thirty-one, 
Sweltered venom sleeping got, 
Boil thou first in the charmed pot ! 
All. Double, double, toil and trouble j 
Fire, burn ; and, caldron, bubble. 

2 Witch. Fillet of a fenny snake, 

In the caldron boil and bake ; 
Eye of newt, and toe of frog ; 
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog ; 
Adder's fork, and blind- worm's sting j 
Lizard's leg, and owlet's wing j 

1 A cat. 2 A toad. 3 Fierce. 



108 Songs from the Dramatists. 

For a charm of powerful trouble ; 
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble. 
All. Double, double, toil and trouble j 
Fire, burn j and, caldron, bubble. 

3 Witch. Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf ; 

"Witches' mummy; maw, and gulf 
Of the ravened salt sea-shark ; 
Root of hemlock, digged i' the dark 5 
Liver of blaspheming Jew ; 
Gall of goat, and slips of yew, 
Silvered in the moon's eclipse ; 
Nose of Turk, and Tartar's lips ; 
Finger of birth strangled babe, 
Ditch- delivered by a drab, 
Make the gruel thick and slab ; 
Add thereto a tiger's chaudron, 1 
For the ingredients of our caldron. 
All. Double, double, toil and trouble ; 
Fire, burn j and, caldron, bubble. 

2 Witch. Cool it with a baboon's blood, 

Then the charm is firm and good. 

tHimon of gtttiens. 



APEMANTUS 7 S GRACE. 

TMMORTAL gods, I crave no pelf ; 

A I pray for no man but myself : 

Grant I may never prove so fond, 

To trust man on his oath or bond ; 

Or a harlot for her weeping ; 

Or a dog that seems a sleeping j 

Or a keeper with my freedom ; 

Or my friends, if I should need 'em. 

Amen. So fall to't : 

Rich men sin, and I eat root. 

1 Entrails. 



Ben Jonson. 109 

SErotlus antof <£t:esstt»a* 



oh! oh! — ha! ha! 

LOVE, love, nothing but love, still more ! 
For, oh, love's bow 
Shoots buck and doe: 
The shaft confounds, 
Not that it wounds, 
But tickles still the sore. 

These lovers cry — Oh ! oh! they die ! 

Yet that which seems the wound to kill, 
Doth turn oh ! oh ! to ha ! ha ! he ! 

So dying love lives still : 
Oh ! oh ! a while, but ha ! ha ! ha ! 
Oh ! oh ! groans out for ha ! ha ! ha ! 

gtntong anii Cleopatra. 

BACCHANALIAN ROUND. 

/70ME, thou monarch of the vine, 
V Plumpy Bacchus, with pink eyne : 
In thy vats our cares be drowned ; 
With thy grapes our hairs be crowned ; 
Cup us, till the world go round 5 
Cup us, till the world go round ! 



BEN JONSON. 
1574—1637. 
After Shakespeare's songs all others appear to disad- 
vantage. He shows an instinctive knowledge of the secret 
of this kind of writing as of everything else. His songs 
possess in perfection all the essential elements of gaiety 
and tenderness, facility and grace, idiomatic purity, melody 



110 Songs from the Dramatists. 

in the expression, variety, suddenness, and completeness. 
In their airiness and sweetness, their spontaneity and full- 
throated ease, they resemble the songs of birds. The con- 
trast with Ben Jonson is striking. Here we have a great 
command of resources, and a visible air of preparation. The 
lines are thoughtful, and occasionally rugged, and must be 
read, even in the singing, with a certain degree of emphasis 
and deliberation. They do not spring at once to the heart and 
the fancy. Without a particle of pedantry, of which Jonson 
was unjustly accused by his detractors, the spirit of the Greek 
anthology is in them, and is felt either in the allusions, the 
phrase, the subject, or the diction. Yet, in a different way, 
they are as charming as Shakespeare's, and worthy to 
stand beside them. If they do not recall the ravishing 
music of the lark or the nightingale, they hold us in the 
spell of some fine instrument whose rich notes are delivered 
with the skill of a master. It is the difference between 
impulse and premeditation, and, in a general sense, between 
nature and art, although we are compelled to acknowledge 
in Shakespeare the presence of the highest art also. Ben 
Jonson is generally supposed to be distinguished chiefly, if 
not exclusively, by his learning and his humour. But his 
songs, his masques, and pastoral scenes are strewn with 
beauties of another order, and exhibit, over and above his 
more special qualities, singular elegance of thought and a 
luxuriant fancy. 

The dates attached to the titles of the plays from which 
the following lyrics are extracted, are the dates of their 
production upon the stage. 

G^ntjna's l&tMs. J 600. 



ECHO MOURNING- THE DEATH OF NARCISSUS. 

CT LOW, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears ; 
H^ Yet slower, yet, faintly gentle springs : 
List to the heavy part the music bears, 

Woe weeps out her division when she sings. 



Ben Jonson. Ill 

Droop herbs and flowers ; 
Fall grief in showers, 
Our beauties are not ours j 
0, I could still, 
Like melting snow upon some craggy hill, 

Drop, drop, drop, drop, 
Since nature's pride is, now, a withered daffodil. 



THE KISS. 

OTHAT joy so soon should waste! 
) Or so sweet a bliss 

As a kiss 
Might not for ever last ! 
So sugared, so melting, so soft, so delicious, 

The dew that lies on roses, 

When the morn herself discloses, 
Is not so precious. 
O rather than I would it smother, 
Were I to taste such another 5 

It should be my wishing 

That I might die kissing. 



THE GLOVE OF THE DEAD LADY. 

CHOI? more than most sweet glove, 
Unto my more sweet love, 
Suffer me to store with kisses 
This empty lodging that now misses 
The pure rosy hand that wore thee, 
Whiter than the kid that bore thee. 
Thou art soft, but that was softer ; 
Cupid's self hath kissed it ofter 
Than e'er he did his mother's doves, 
Supposing her the queen of loves, 
That was thy mistress, 
Best of gloves. 



112 Songs from the Dramatists. 

HYMN TO DIANA. 

QUEEN, and huntress, chaste and fair, 
Now the sun is laid to sleep, 
Seated in thy silver chair, 
State in wonted manner keep : ' 
Hesperus entreats thy light, 
Goddess excellently "bright. 

Earth, let not thy envious shade 

Dare itself to interpose ; 
Cynthia's shining orb was made 
Heaven to clear when day did close : 
Bless us then with wished sight, 
Goddess excellently bright. 

Lay thy bow of pearl apart, 

And thy crystal shining quiver ; 
Give unto thy flying hart 
Space to breathe, how short soever : 
Thou that makest a day of night, 
Goddess excellently bright. 

&$e poetaster. J 60). 



THE LOVER'S IDEAL. 

IF I freely may discover 
What would please me in my lover, 

I would have her fair and witty, 

Savouring more of court than city ; 

A^ little proud, but full of pity ; 

,Light and humorous in her toying ; 

Oft building hopes, and soon destroying ; 

Long, but sweet in the enjoying ; 
Neither too easy nor too hard, 
All extremes I would have barred. 

1 Come, but keep thy wonted state, 
With, even step, and mincing gait. 

Milton.— II Penseroso. 



Ben Jonson. 113 

She should be allowed her passions, 
So they were but used as fashions ; 
Sometimes froward, and then frowning, 
Sometimes sickish, and then swooning, 
Every fit with change still crowning. 
Purely jealous I would have her, 
Then only constant when I crave her ; 
'Tis a virtue should not save her. 

Thus, nor her delicates would cloy me, 

Nor her peevishness annoy me. 1 

WANTON CUPID. 

LOVE is blind, and a wanton ; 
In the whole world, there is scant [one] 

One such another : 

No, not his mother. 
He hath plucked her doves and sparrows, 
To feather his sharp arrows, 

And alone prevaileth, 

While sick Venus waileth. 
But if Cypris once recover 
The wag; it shall behove her 

To look better to him, 

Or she will undo him. 

WAKE J MUSIC AND WINE. 

7TYAKE, our mirth begins to die, 
*** Quicken it with tunes and wines 
Eaise your notes; you're out: fy, fy! 
This drowsiness is an ill sign. 

1 The germ of this song may be traced to the following epigram of 
Martial: 

' Qxialem, Flacce, velim quseris, nolimve puellam, 
Nolo nimis facilem, difficilemve nimis : 
Illud quod medium est, atque inter utrumque probamus, 
Nee volo quod cruciat, nee volo quod satiat.' 
Thus rendered by Elphinston : 

• What a fair, my dear Flaccus, I like or dislike ? 
I approve not the dame, or too kind, or too coy; 
The sweet medium be mine : no extremities strike : 
I'll have her who knows nor to torture nor cloy.' 



114 Songs from the Dramatists. 

We banish him the quire of gods, 

That droops again : 

Then all are men, 
For here's not one, but nods. 



THE FEAST OP THE SENSES. 

THEN, in a free and lofty strain, 
Our broken tunes we thus repair; 
And we answer them again, 

Running division on the panting air ; 

To celebrate this feast of sense, 

As free from scandal as offence. 

Here is beauty for the eye; 

For the ear sweet melody; 
Ambrosial odours for the smell ; 

Delicious nectar for the taste $ 

For the touch a lady's waist ; 
Which doth all the rest excel ! 



Vt\$fmz $ or, t$e jfor* J 605. 



FOOLS. 



FOOLS, they are the only nation 
Worth men's envy or admiration 5 
Free from care or sorrow-taking, 
Selves and others merry making : 
All they speak or do is sterling. 
Your fool he is your great man's darling, 
And your ladies' sport and pleasure ; 
Tongue and babble are his treasure. 
Even his face begetteth laughter, 
And he speaks truth free from slaughter; 1 
He's the grace of every feast, 
And sometimes the chief est guest ; 

1 Reason here, observes one of der being the word apparently de- 
Jonson's commentators, has been signed, 
made to suffer for the rhyme, slan- 



Ben Jonson. 115 

Hath his trencher and his stool, 
When wit waits upon the fool. 
0, who would not be 
He, he, he? 1 



LOVE WHILE WE CAN. 

ff OME, my Celia, let us prove, 
V While we can the sports of love, 
Time will not be ours for ever, 
He, at length, our good will sever ; 
Spend not then his gifts in vain, 
Suns that set may rise again : 
But if once we lose this light, 
'Tis with us perpetual night. 
Why should we defer our joys ¥ 
Fame and rumour are but toys. 
Cannot we delude the eyes 
Of a few poor household spies ¥ 
Or his easier ears beguile, 
Thus removed by our wile ? 
'Tis no sin love's fruits to steal 5 
But the sweet thefts to reveal 
To be taken, to be seen, 
These have crimes accounted been. 2 



2Tf)e (Euteen's fflLuxqut. J605. 



THE BIRTH OF LOVE. 

CO beauty on the waters stood, 

^P When love had severed earth from flood 5 

So when he parted air from fire, 

He did with concord all inspire ; 

1 There is a Fool's Song, in the taken from Catollus. It was a 
Bird in a Cageoi Shirley (see Shir- favourite theme with the old dra- 
ley's songs in this volume) which matists, and will he found treated 
seems to he formed upon this song, in a variety of ways amongst their 

2 The leading idea of this song is songs. 



116 Songs from the Dramatists. 

.And there a matter he then taught 
That elder than himself was thought ; 
Which thought was yet the child of earth, 
For Love is older than his birth. 



CUPIDS SHOOTING AT RANDOM. 

IF all these Cupids now were blind, 
As is their wanton brother, 
Or play should put it in their mind 

To shoot at one another, 
What pretty battle they would make, 
If they their object should mistake, 
And each one wound his mother. 



IBjuccmej or, ti)c SUent ffi8?onratu 1609. 



THE GRACE OF SIMPLICITY. 

CT TILL to be neat, still to be drest, 
V As you were going to a feast ; 
Still to be powdered, still perfumed : 
Lady, it is to be presumed, 
Though art's hid causes are not found, 
All is not sweet, all is not sound. 

Give me a look, give me a face, 

That makes simplicity a grace; 

Robes loosely flowing, hair as free : 

Such sweet neglect more taketh me, 

Than all the adulteries of art ; 

They strike mine eyes, but not my heart. 1 

lTMs is one of the best known flattery and delightful sentiment of 
of Jonson's songs, and a remark- the second. Nothing less than the 
able illustration of the art with fascinating result to which it leads 
which he constructed these com- us could excuse its want of gal- 
positions. The first verse is an lantry. 
evident preparation for the skilful 



Ben Jonson. 117 

2Sartt)olometo tfziv. J6;J4. 



THE BALLAD OF THE CUT-PURSE. 1 

mY masters, and Mends, and good people, draw 
near, 
And look to your purses for that I do say ; 
And though, little money in them you do bear, 
It cost more to get, than to lose in a day. 

1 In the Roxburghe collection It escaped Mr. Collier that the first 
there is a ballad with the following five stanzas are in Ben Jon son's 
title:— 'A Caveat for Cut- Purses, vl&y of Bart7wlomew Fair, acted for 
With a warning to all purse car- the first time on the 31st October, 
riers, shewing the confidence of the 1614, at the Hope theatre, Bank- 
first, and the carelessness of the side. The song is sung by Night- 
last, with necessary admonitions for ingale, a ballad singer in the fair, 
them both, lest the hangman get and immediately afterwards Edg- 
the one, and the beggar the other.' worth, a cut-purse, puts its doc- 
Mr. CoUier observes upon it that trines into practice by picking the 
' this singular ballad preceded the pocket of a country-gentleman, and 
Restoration, and indeed the civil handing over the purse he has 
wars, and the mention in it of Dun, stolen to the ballad singer. The 
the public hangman, is one proof additional verses in the broad 
of its date ; ' and he adds, ' it is to sheet, containing the allusion to 
be observed that the ballad singer Dun, the hangman, who seems to 
speaks in his own person; and, have succeeded to his office in 1616, 
were it not for the conclusion, we two years after the play was 
might suppose that the production produced, were evidently added 
was a 'jig' which had been per- afterwards. They extend the bal- 
formed by a comic actor at the lad to ten verses, and run as fol- 
Curtain, the Red Bull, or some low: 
other popular place of amusement.' 

The players do tell you, in Bartholomew Fair, 

What secret consumptions and rascals you are ; 
For one of their actors, it seems, had the fate 
By some of your trade to be fleeced of late : 
Then fall to your prayers, 
You that are way-layers, 
They're fit to choose all the world that can cheat players ; 
For he hath the art, and no man the worse, 
Whose cunning can pilfer the pilferer's purse. 

Youth, youth, <&c. 

The plain countryman that comes staring to London, 

If once you come near him he quickly is undone, 
For when he amazedly gazeth about, 
One treads on his toes, and the other pulls it out : 
Then in a strange place, 
Where he knows no face, 
His money is gone, 'tis a pitiful case. 



118 Songs from the Dramatists. 

You oft have been told, 
Both the young and the old, 
And bidden beware of the Cut-purse so bold ! 
Then if you take heed not, free me from the curse, 
Who both give you warning, for, and the Cut-purse. 
Youth, youth, thou hadst better been starved by thy 
Than live to be hanged for cutting a purse. [nurse, 

It hath been upbraided to men of my trade, 

That oftentimes we are the cause of this crime : 

Alack, and for pity ! why should it be said, 
As if they regarded or places or time ? 

The Devil in hell in his trade is not worse, 
Than Gilter, and Diver, and Cntter of purse. 

Youth, youth, &c. 

The poor servant maid wears her purse in her placket, 

A place of quick feeling, and yet you can take it; 
Nor is she aware that you have done the feat, 
Until she is going to pay for her meat ; 
Then she cries and rages 
Amongst all the baggages, 
And swears at one thrust she hath lost all her wages ; 
For she is engaged her own to disburse, 
To make good the breach of the cruel Cut-purse. 
Youth, youth, &c. 

Your eyes and your fingers are nimble of growth, 

But Dun many times hath been nimbler than both ; 
Yet you are deceived by many a slut, 
But the hangman is only the Cut-purse's cut. 
It makes you to vex 
When he bridles your necks, 
And then, at the last, what becomes of your tricks ? 
But when you should pray, you begin for to curse 
The hand that first showed you to slash at a purse. 
Youth, youth, &c. 

But now to my hearers this counsel I give, 

And pray, friends, remember it as long as you live ; 
Bring out no more cash in purse, pocket, or wallet, 
Than one single penny to pay for this ballad ; 
For Cut-purse doth shroud 
Himself in a cloud, 
There's many a purse hath been lost in a crowd, 
For he's the most rogue that doth cry up, and curses, 
Who first cries, ' My masters, beware of your purses.' 
Oh ! youth, &c. 

An inferior hand may be easily the writer changes the alternate 
detected in these supplementary rhymes to couplets. 
verses. It will be seen, also, that 



Ben Jonson. 119 

Examples have been 
Of some that were seen 
In Westminster-hall, yea, the pleaders between ; 
Then why should the judges be free from this curse, 
More than my poor self for cutting the purse ? 
Youth, youth, &c. 

At Worcester, 'tis known well, and even in the jail, 

A knight of good worship did there show his face 
Against the foul sinners hi zeal for to rail, 

And lost (ipso facto) his purse in the place. 
Nay, once from the seat 
Of judgment so great, 
A judge there did lose a fair purse of velvate. 
O Lord ! for thy mercy, how wicked, or worse, 
Are those that so venture their necks for a purse ! 
Youth, youth, &c. 

At plays, and at sermons, and at the sessions, 

'Tis daily their practice such booty to make ; 
Yea, under the gallows, at executions, 

They stick not the stare-abouts' purses to take. 
Nay, one without grace, 
At a better place, 
At court, and in Christmas, before the king's face. 
Alack, then for pity ! must I bear the curse, 
That only belongs to the cunning Cut-purse ? 
Youth, youth, &c. 

But 0, you vile nation of Cut-purses all, 

Relent and repent, and amend and be sound, 
And know that you ought not by honest men's fall 

Advance your own fortunes, to die above ground j 
And though you go gay 
In silks as you may, 
It is not the high way to heaven, as they say. 
Repent then, repent you, for better, for worse, 
And kiss not the gallows for cutting a purse. 
Youth, youth, &c. 



120 Songs from the Dramatists. 

8:f>e Neto Ktraj or, t&e SLfg&t &euvU J 639. 

A VISION OP BEACJTY. 

IT was a beauty that I saw 
So pure, so perfect, as the frame 

Of all the universe was lame, 
To that one figure could I draw, 
Or give least line of it a law ! 

A skein of silk without a knot ! 
A fair march made without a halt ! 
A curious form without a fault! 

A printed book without a blot ! 

All beauty, and without a spot. 

3£J>e <SaU <Sf)ej)i)eru ; or, a Sale of 3&obin ^ootr. 1 

LOVE AND DEATH. 

THOUGH I am young and cannot tell 
Either what death or love is well, 
Yet I have heard they both bear darts, 
And both do aim at human hearts ; 
And then again, I have been told, 
Love wounds with heat, as death with cold; 
So that I fear they do but bring 
Extremes to touch, and mean one thing. 

As in a ruin we it call, 
One thing to be blown up, or fall ; 
Or to our end, like way may have, 
By a flash of lightning, or a wave : 
So love's inflamed shaft or brand, 
May kill as soon as death's cold hand; 
Except love's fires the virtue have 
To fright the frost out of the grave. 

1 This piece, a dramatic pastoral, are all that have come down to us. 

in the manner of the Faithful Shep- They abound in passages of exquis- 

herdess of Fletcher, was left unfln- ite beauty, and display his mastery 

ished by Jonson at his death. Only over a species of poetry in which 

two acts, and a fragment of a third, he is least appreciated. 



Beaumont and Fletcher, * 121 

Stye jForest*' 



TO CELIA. 

DRINK to me only with thine eyes, 
And I will pledge with mine ; 
Or leave a Mss but in the cup, 

And I'll not look for wine. 
The thirst that from the soul doth rise, 

Doth ask a drink divine : 
But might I of Jove's nectar sup, 
I would not change for thine. 

I sent thee late a rosy wreath, 

Not so much honouring thee, 
As giving it a hope that there 

It could not withered be ; 
But thou thereon didst only breathe, 

And sent'st it back to me ; 
Since when it grows, and smells, I swear, 

Not of itself, but thee. 




FRANCIS BEAUMONT AND JOHN FLETCHER. 
1584—1616. 1579—1625. 

Variety, grace, and sweetness are the predominant 
characteristics of Beaumont and Fletcher's songs. They 
occupy a middle region between Shakespeare and Jonson. 
The individual hand of either poet cannot be traced with 
certainty in any of these pieces. We learn from the tradi- 
tions which have reached us, that they lived together on 
the Bank-side, and not only pursued their studies in close 
companionship, but carried their community of habits so 
far that they had only one bench between them, and used 
the same clothes and cloaks in common. Beaumont has got 
the credit (though the younger man) of possessing the 
restraining judgment, and Fletcher the overflowing fancy 
1 A collection of Jonson's smaller poems. 
6 



122 *- Songs from the Dramatists. 

and exuberant wit. There can be no doubt, however, from 
the allusions of the Prologues and Commendatory Verses, 
that Fletcher had by far the larger share in the plays ; and, 
if such a conjecture may be hazarded upon internal evidence, 
the bulk of the songs may be ascribed to him also. They 
are full of that luxuriance and beauty which distinguish 
the pieces known to have been written by him separately. 

CONSTANCY. 

LAY a garland on my hearse 
Of the dismal yew ; 
Maidens, willow branches bear ; 
Say, I died true. 

My love was false, but I was firm 

From my hour of birth. 
Upon my buried body lie 

Lightly, gentle earth ! 

FICKLENESS. 

I COULD never have the power 
To love one above an hour, 
But my head would prompt mine eye 
On some other man to fly. 
Venus, fix thou mine eyes fast, 
Or if not, give me all that I shall see at last. 

&%z lEUrer a&rotfjer* 1 



THE STUDENT AWAKENED BY LOVE. 

BEAUTY clear and fair, 
Where the air 
Rather like a perfume dwells ; 
Where the violet and the rose 
Their blue veins in blush disclose, 
And came to honour nothing else. 

1 Ascribed to Fletcher. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 123 

Where to live near, 

And planted there, 

Is to live, and still live new ; 
Where to gain a f avonr is 
More than light, perpetual bliss, — 

Make me live by serving yon. 

Dear, again back recall 
To this light, 

A stranger to himself and all ; 
Both the wonder and the story 
Shall be yours, and eke the glory: 

I am your servant, and your thrall. 



&$* Ssjmrtistj ©urate. 1 



SPEAK, LOVE! 2 

DEAREST, do not delay me, 
Since, thou knowest, I must be gone ; 
Wind and tide, 'tis thought, doth stay me, 
But 'tis wind that must be blown 

From that breath, whose native smell 
Indian odours far excel. 

Oh, then speak, thou fairest fair! 

Kill not him that vows to serve thee ; 
But perfume this neighbouring air, 3 

Else dull silence, sure, will starve me : 
'Tis a word that's quickly spoken, 
Which, being restrained, a heart is broken. 

1 By Fletcher. places in which they were inserted 

2 This song, and that which im- indicate that some songs were in- 
mediately follows, not having ap- tended to be introduced by the 
peared in the original edition of the authors ; and, to whatever hand 
Spanish Curate, were removed we are indebted for these, they are 
from the text by Mr. Colman. The entitled to preservation in this col- 
authorship is, of course, doubtful ; lection. 

but the stage directions in the 3 This looks either like the au- 



124 Songs from the Dramatists. 



COUNTRY FEASTING. 

LET the bells ring, and let the boys sing, 
The young lasses skip and play ; 
Let the cups go round, 'till round goes the ground; 
Our learned old vicar will stay. 

Let the pig turn merrily, merrily, ah ! 

And let the fat goose swim ; 
For verily, verily, verily, ah ! 

Our vicar this day shall be trim. 1 

The stewed cock shall crow, coek-a-loodle-loo, 
A loud cock-a-loodle shall he crow ; 

The duck and the drake shall swim in a lake 
Of onions and claret below. 

Our wives shall be neat, to bring in our meat 

To thee our most noble adviser ; 
Our pains shall be great, and bottles shall sweat, 

And we ourselves will be wiser. 

We'll labour and swink, 2 we'll Mss and we'll drink, 
And tithes shall come thicker and thicker j 

We'll fall to our plough, and get children enow, 
And thou shalt be learned old vicar. 

thorship of Fletcher, or an inten- sage occurs in a preceding song : 
tional imitation. A similar pas- 

' Beanty clear and fair, 
Where the air 
Rather like a perfume dwells,' &c. 

1 Dibdin appears to have founded the burthen of a song in the Quaker 
on this verse : 

' When the lads of the village shall merrily, ah, 

Sound the tabors, I'll hand thee along ; 
And I say unto thee, that verily, ah ! 
Thou and I will be first in the throng.' 

2 To work hard. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 125 



TAKE ME WHILE f M IN THE VEIN. 

CHE fit's upon me now, 
The fit's upon me now ! 
Come quickly, gentle lady, 
The fit's upon me now ! 
The world shall soon know they're fools, 

And so shalt thou do too j 
Let the cobbler meddle with his tools, 
The fit's upon me now ! 



d&tQQWCfi' aSusl)* 1 



THE KING OF THE BEGGARS. 

ft AST our caps and cares away : 
V This is beggar's holiday ! 
At the crowning of our king, 
Thus we ever dance and sing. 
In the world look out and see, 
"Where's so happy a prince as he ? 
Where the nation fives so free, 
And so merry as do we ? 
Be it peace, or be it war, 
Here at liberty we are, 
And enjoy our ease and rest : 
To the field we are not pressed ; 
Nor are called into the town, 
To be troubled with the gown. 
Hang all offices, we cry, 
And the magistrate too, by ! 
"When the subsidy's encreased, 
We are not a penny sessed ; 

l Ascribed to Fletcher. 



126 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Nor will any go to law 
"With the beggar for a straw. 
All which happiness, he brags, 
He doth owe unto his rags. 



Qlty tumorous MmttmnU 1 



V 



THE LOVE PHILTER. 

>ISE from the shades below, 
All you that prove 
The helps of loose love ! 
Rise, and bestow 
Upon this cup whatever may compel, 
By powerful charm and unresisted spell, 
A heart un warmed to melt in love's desires ! 
Distil into liquor all your fires } 
Heats, longings, tears ; 
But keep back frozen fears j 
That she may know, that has all power defied, 
Art is a power that will not be denied. 



&$* iFaitfrful SJjepljer&ess* 2 



THE SATYR. 



CHROUG-H yon same bending plain 
That flings his arms down to the main, 
And through these thick woods, 4 have I run, 
Whose bottom never kissed the sun 



1 Also ascribed to Fletcher by or three similar pieces extracted 
the writers of the commendatory from the same pastoral comedy, 
verses, and confirmed by the an- may be allowed to justify their in. 
thority of a MS. referred to by Mr. sertion in this volume, if their 
Dyce. beauty stand in need of any plea for 

2 The sole production of Fletcher, their admission. 

3 The lyrical character of this 4 Mr. Seward traces an imita- 
soliloqLuy of the Satyr, and of two tion of Shakespeare's Midsummer 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 127 

Since the lusty spring began j 

All to please my Master Pan, 

Have I trotted without rest 

To get him fruit ; for at a feast 

He entertains, this coming night, 

His paramour, the Syrinx bright. 

But, behold a fairer sight ! 

By that heavenly form of thine, 

Brightest fair, thou art divine, 

Sprung from great immortal race 

Of the gods ; for in thy face 

Shines more awful majesty, 

Than dull weak mortality 

Dare with misty eyes behold, 

And live ! Therefore on this mould 

Lowly do I bend my knee 

In worship of thy deity. 

Deign it, goddess, from my hand, 

To receive whate'er this land 

From her fertile womb doth send 

Of her choice fruits ; and but lend 

Belief to that the Satyr tells : 

Fairer by the famous wells 

To this present day ne'er grew, 

Never better nor more true. 

Here be grapes, whose lusty blood 

Is the learned poet's good, 

Sweeter yet did never crown 

The head of Bacchus j nuts more brown 

Nights Dream in the beginning passage is in the speech of the 
and ending of this soliloquy. The Fairy : 

• Over hill, over dale, 

Thorough hush, thorough brier, 
Over park, over pale, 
Thorough flood, thorough fire,' &c. 

A still closer imitation of Fletcher gations not only to the imagery and 
himself may be found in the Comus general treatment, but to the plan 
of Milton, which owes large obli- of the Faithful Shepherdess. 



128 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Than the squirrel's teeth that crack them ; 

Deign, oh fairest fair, to take them ! 

For these black-eyed Dryope 

Hath often-times commanded me 

With my clasped knee to climb : 

See how well the lusty time 

Hath decked their rising cheeks in red, 

Such as on your lips is spread ! 

Here be berries for a queen, 

Some be red, some be green ; 

These are of that luscious meat, 

The great god Pan himself doth eat : 

All these, and what the woods can yield, 

The hanging mountain, or the field, 

I freely offer, and ere long 

Will bring you more, more sweet and strong ; 

Till when, humbly leave I take, 

Lest the great Pan do awake, 

That sleeping lies in a deep glade, 

Under a broad beech's shade. 

I must go, I must run 

Swifter than the fiery sun. 

THE PRAISES OP PAN. 

CT ING his praises that doth keep 
H* Our flocks from harm, 
Pan, the father of our sheep ; 

And arm in arm 
Tread we softly in a round, 
Whilst the hollow neighbouring ground 
Fills the music with her sound. 

Pan, oh, great god Pan, to thee 

Thus do we sing ! 
Thou that keep'st us chaste and free 

As the young spring ; 
Ever be thy honour spoke, 
From that place the morn is spoke, 
To that place day doth unyoke ! 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 129 



THE INVITATION. 

/TOME, shepherds, come ! 
V Come away 

Without delay 
Whilst the gentle time doth stay. 

Green woods are dumb, 
And will never tell to any 
Those dear kisses, and those many 
Sweet embraces, that are given, 
Dainty pleasures, that would even 
Raise in coldest age a fire, 
And give virgin blood desire. 

Then, if ever, 

Now or never, 

Come and have it : 
Think not I 
Dare deny, 

If you crave it. 

EVENING SONG OF PAN'S PRIEST. 

CT HEPHERDS all, and maidens fair, 
H^ Fold your flocks up, for the air 
'Gins to thicken, and the sun 
Already his great course hath run. 
See the dew-drops how they Mss 
Every little flower that is, 
Hanging on their velvet heads, 
Like a rope of crystal beads : 
See the heavy clouds low falling, 
And bright Hesperus down calling 
The dead Night from under ground ; 
At whose rising mists unsound, 
Damps and vapours fly apace, 
Hovering o'er the wanton face 
Of these pastures, where they come, 
Striking dead both bud and bloom : 



6a 



130 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Therefore, from such danger lock 
Every one his loved flock ; 
And let yonr dogs lie loose without, 
Lest the wolf come as a scout 
From the mountain, and, ere day, 
Bear a lamb or Md away ; 
Or the crafty thievish fox 
Break upon your simple flocks. 
To secure yourselves from these, 
Be not too secure in ease ; 
Let one eye his watches keep, 
Whilst the other eye doth sleep ; 
So you shall good shepherds prove, 
And for ever hold the love 
Of our great god. Sweetest slumbers, 
And soft silence, fall in numbers 
On your eye-lids ! So, farewell ! 
Thus I end my evening's knell. 

THE SULLEN SHEPHERD TO AMARILLIS ASLEEP. 

FROM thy forehead thus I take 
These herbs, and charge thee not awake 
'Till in yonder holy well 
Thrice, with powerful magic spell, 
Filled with many a baleful word, 
Thou hast been dipped. Thus, with my chord 
Of blasted hemp, by moonlight twined, 
I do thy sleepy body bind. 
I turn thy head unto the east, 1 
And thy feet unto the west, 
Thy left arm to the south put forth, 
And thy right unto the north. 
I take thy body from the ground, 
In this deep and deadly swound, 

1 Thus in Cymbeline : — 

' Nay, Cadwal, we must lay his head to the east ; 
My father had a reason for't.' 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 131 

And into this holy spring 
I let thee slide down by my string. 
Take this maid, thou holy pit, 
To thy bottom ; nearer yet ; 
In thy water pure and sweet, 
By thy leave I dip her feet ; 
Thus I let her lower yet, 
That her ankles may be wetj 
Yet down lower, let her knee 
In thy waters washed be. 
There stop. Fly away, 1 
Everything that loves the day ! 
Truth, that hath but one face, 
Thus I charm thee from this place. 
Snakes that cast your coats for new, 
Chamelions that alter hue, 
Hares that yearly sexes change, 
Proteus altering oft and strange, 
Hecate, with shapes three, 
Let this maiden changed be, 
With this holy water wet, 
To the shape of Amoret ! 
Cynthia, work thou with my charm ! 
Thus I draw thee, free from harm, 
Up out of this blessed lake. 
Rise both like her and awake ! 

THE SATYR'S WATCH. 

nOW, whilst the moon doth rule the sky, 
And the stars, whose feeble light 
Give[s] a pale shadow to the night, 

1 Regarding this line as an ' nn- words,' Mr. Seward and Mr. Symp- 

musical hemistich' occasioned pro- son altered it to 
bably ' by the loss of one or more 

1 There I stop. Now fly away.' 

With such scrupulous ears for and that is really unmusical. The 

syllabic completeness, it is surpris- abruptness of the line they have 

ing they did not fill out a hemistich altered was obviously intentional, 
that occurs a few lines lower down, 



132 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Are up ; great Pan commanded me 

To walk this grove about, whilst he, 

In a corner of the wood, 

Where never mortal foot hath stood, 

Keeps dancing, music, and a feast, 

To entertain a lovely guest : 

Where he gives her many a rose, 

Sweeter than the breath that blows 

The leaves, grapes, berries of the best ; 

I never saw so great a feast. 

But, to my charge. Here must I stay, 

To see what mortals lose their way, 

And by a false fire, seeming bright, 

Train them in and leave them right. 

Then must I watch if any be 

Forcing of a chastity ; 

If I find it, then in haste 

Give my wreathed horn a blast, 

And the fairies all will run, 

Wildly dancing by the moon, 

And will pinch him to the bone, 

Till his lustful thoughts be gone. 

Back again about this ground ; 

Sure I hear a mortal sound. — 

I bind thee by this powerful spell, 

By the waters of this well, 

By the gnmmering moon-beams bright, 

Speak again, thou mortal wight ! 

Here the foolish mortal lies, 
Sleeping on the ground. Arise ! 
The poor wight is almost dead ; 
On the ground his wounds have bled, 
And his clothes fouled with his blood : 
To my goddess in the wood 
Will I lead him, whose hands pure 
Will help this mortal wight to cure. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 133 



AMORET AND THE RIVER-GOD. 

God. 7TYHAT powerful charms my streams do bring 
*■*' Back again unto their spring, 
With such force, that I their god, 
Three times striking with my rod, 
Could not keep them in their ranks ? 
My fishes shoot into the banks ; 
There's not one that stays and feeds, 
All have hid them in the weeds. 
Here's a mortal almost dead, 
Fallen into my river-head, 
Hallowed so with many a spell, 
That till now none ever fell. 
'Tis a female young and clear, 
Cast in by some ravisher: 
See upon her breast a wound, 
On which there is no plaster bound. 
Yet she's warm, her pulses beat, 
'Tis a sign of life and heat. — 
If thou be'st a virgin pure, 
I can give a present cure : 
Take a drop into thy wound, 
From my watery locks, more round 
Than orient pearl, and far more pure 
Than unchaste flesh may endure. — 
See, she pants, and from her flesh 
The warm blood gusheth out afresh. 
She is an unpolluted maid j 
I must have this bleeding staid. 
From my banks I pluck this flower 
With holy hand, whose virtuous power 
Is at once to heal and draw. — 
The blood returns. I never saw 
A fairer mortal. Now doth break 
Her deadly slumber. Virgin, speak, [breath, 

Amoret. Who hath restored my sense, given me new 
And brought me back out of the arms of death ? 



134 Songs from the Dramatists. 

God. I have healed thy wounds. 

Amoret. Ah me ! 

God. Fear not him that succoured thee, 
I am this fountain's god. Below, 
My waters to a river grow, 
And 'twixt two banks with osiers set, 
That only prosper in the wet, 
Through the meadows do they glide, 
Wheeling still on every side, 
Sometimes winding round about, 
To find the evenest channel out. 
And if thou wilt go with me, 
Leaving mortal company, 
In the cool streams shalt thou lie, 
Free from harm as well as I : 
I will give thee for thy food 
No fish that useth in the mud ; 
But trout and pike, that love to swim 
Where the gravel from the brim 
Through the pure streams may be seen : 
Orient pearl fit for a queen 
Will I give, thy love to win, 
And a shell to keep them in ; 
Not a fish in all my brook 
That shall disobey thy look, 
But, when thou wilt, come sliding by, 
And from thy white hand take a fly : 
And to make thee understand 
How I can my waves command, 
They shall bubble whilst I sing, 
Sweeter than the silver string. 

The Song. 

Do not fear to put thy feet 

Naked in the river sweet ; 

Think not leech, or newt, or toad, 

Will bite thy foot, when thou hast trod ; 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 135 

Nor let the water rising high, 
As thou wad'st in, make thee cry 
And sob ; but ever live with me, 
And not a wave shall trouble thee ! 



SONG TO PAN. 

ALL ye woods, and trees, and bowers, 
All ye virtues and ye powers 
That inhabit in the lakes, 
In the pleasant springs or brakes, 
Move your feet 
To our sound, 
Whilst we greet 
All this ground 
With his honour and his name 
That defends our flocks from blame. 

He is great, and he is just, 
He is ever good, and must 
Thus be honoured. Daffodillies, 
Roses, pinks, and loved lilies, 

Let us fling, 

Whilst we sing, 

Ever holy, 

Ever holy, 
Ever honoured, ever young ! 
Thus great Pan is ever sung. 

THE SATYB'S LEAVE-TAKING. 

T^HOU divinest, fairest, brightest, 

^ Thou most powerful maid, and whitest, 

Thou most virtuous and most blessed, 

Eyes of stars, and golden tressed 

Like Apollo ! tell me, sweetest, 

What new service now is meetest 

For the Satyr * Shall I stray 

In the middle air, and stay 



136 Songs from the Dramatists. 

The sailing rack, or nimbly take 
Hold by the moon, and gently make 
Suit to the pale queen of night 
For a beam to give thee light ? 
Shall I dive into the sea, 
And bring thee coral, making way 
Through the rising waves that fall 
In snowy fleeces ? Dearest, shall 
I catch thee wanton fawns, or flies 
Whose woven wings the summer dyes 
Of many colours ? get thee fruit, 
Or steal from Heaven old Orpheus' lute ? 
AH these I'll venture for, and more, 
To do her service all these woods adore. 

Holy virgin, I will dance 
Round about these woods as quick 
As the breaking light, and prick 
Down the lawns and down the vales 
Faster than the wind-mill sails. 
So I take my leave, and pray 
All the comforts of the day, 
Such as Phoebus' heat doth send 
On the earth, may still befriend 
Thee and this arbour ! * 



1 The functions of the Satyr in well of the Attendant Spirit is a 

this pastoral and the Attendant direct imitation, and the lines 

Spirit in Comus are identical; and toward the end are inferior in 

there are few passages in Milton beauty to the original. The 

finer or more exquisite than this couplet, 
last address of the Satyr. Thefare- 

* But now my task is smoothly done, 
I can fly, or I can run,' 

is transplanted almost verbally from the first speech of the Satyr : 

' I must go, and I must run, 
Swifter than the fiery sun.' 

As a whole, however, the last licence of versification, and the 
speech of the Attendant Spirit gorgeous loveliness of its imagery, 
transcends its prototype in magni- 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 137 

Stye J&ati Hotoer^ 



THE LOVER'S LEGACY TO HIS CRUEL MISTRESS. 

GO, happy heart ! for thou shalt lie 
Intombed in her for whom I die, 
Example of her cruelty. 

Tell her, if she chance to chide 

Me for slowness, in her pride, 

That it was for her I died. 

If a tear escape her eye, 

'Tis not for my memory, 

But thy rites of obsequy. 

The altar was my loving breast, 

My heart the sacrificed beast, 

And I was myself the priest. 

Your body was the sacred shrine, 

Your cruel mind the power divine, 

Pleased with the hearts of men, not Mne. 

THE WARNING OP ORPHEUS. 

ORPHEUS I am, come from the deeps below, 
To thee, fond man, the plagues of love to show. 
To the fair fields where loves eternal dwell 
There's none that come, but first they pass through hell 
Hark, and beware ! unless thou hast loved, ever 
Beloved again, thou shalt see those joys never. 
Hark ! how they groan that died despairing ! 

Oh, take heed, then ! 
Hark/how they howl for over-daring ! 
All these were men. 

They that be fools, and die for fame, 
They lose their name ; 
And they that bleed 
Hark how they speed. 

1 Ascribed to Fletcher. 



138 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Now in cold frosts, now scorching fires 
They sit, and curse their lost desires j 
Nor shall these souls be free from pains and fears, 
'Till women waft them over in their tears. 



TO VENUS. 

OH, fair sweet goddess, queen of loves, 
Soft and gentle as thy doves, 
Humble-eyed, and ever rueing 
These poor hearts, their loves pursuing ! 
Oh, thou mother of delights, 
Crowner of all happy nights, 
Star of dear content and pleasure, 
Of mutual loves the endless treasure ! 
Accept this sacrifice we bring, 
Thou continual youth and spring ; 
Grant this lady her desires, 
And every hour we'll crown thy fires. 

THE BATTLE OF PELUSIUM. 

7T RM, arm, arm, arm ! the scouts are all come in ; 
■**- Keep your ranks close, and now your honours win. 
Behold from yonder hill the foe appears j 
Bows, bills, glaves, arrows, shields, and spears ! 
Like a dark wood 1 he comes, or tempest pouring; 
Oh, view the wings of horse the meadows scouring. 
The van-guard marches bravely. Hark, the drums ! 

Dub, dub. 
They meet, they meet, and now the battle comes : 

1 One of the commentators pro- succeeded better than their critic, 

poses to read cloud for wood. These The coming of the dark wood is 

emendations are very provoking, grander than the cloud. The rout 

because they are supported by a and uproar of battle are admirably 

certain show of reason. But the depicted. There are few specimens 

writers of this hurricane song were of this kind in these Dramatic 

not thinking of the literal reason of Songs. The most animated and 

the matter, but of the suggestive- picturesque is a Sea-fight by 

ness of the image. And they have Dryden. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 139 

See how the arrows fly, 
That darken all the sky ! 
Hark how the trumpets sound, 
Hark how the hills rebound, 

Tara, tara, tara, tara, tara. 

Hark how the horses charge ! in, boys, boys, in ! 
The battle totters ; now the wounds begin : 
Oh, how they cry ! 
Oh, how they die ! 
Room for the valiant Memnon, armed with thunder ! 

See how he breaks the ranks asunder ! 
They fly ! they fly ! Eumenes has the chase, 
And brave Polybius makes good his place. 

To the plains, to the woods, 

To the rocks, to the floods, 
They fly for succour. Follow, follow, follow ! 
Hark how the soldiers hollow ! Hey, hey ! 

Brave Diocles is dead, 

And all his soldiers fled ; 

The battle's won, and lost, 

That many a life hath cost. 

STf)e 3Logal Subject* 1 



B 



THE BROOM-MAN'S SONG. 

ROOM, broom, the bonny broom ! 
Come, buy my birchen broom : 
In the wars we have no more room, 
Buy all my bonny broom ! 
For a kiss take two ; 
If those will not do, 
For a little, little pleasure, 
Take all my whole treasure : 
If all these will not do't, 
Take the broom-man to boot. 
Broom, broom, the bonny broom ! 
1 By Fletcher. 



140 Songs from the Dramatists, 



TO OESAR AND CLEOPATRA ON THE NILE. 

Isis. TSIS, tlie goddess of this land, 

A Bids thee, great Caesar, understand 
And mark our customs : and first know, 
"With greedy eyes these watch the glow, 
Of plenteous Nilus ; when he comes, 
With songs, with dances, timbrels, drums, 
They entertain him ; cut his way, 
And give his proud heads leave to play ; 

Nilus himself shall rise, and shew 

His matchless wealth in overflow. 
Labourers. Come, let us help the reverend Nile j 
He's very old j alas, the while ! 
Let us dig him easy ways, 
And prepare a thousand plays : 
To delight his streams, let's sing 
A loud welcome to our spring ; 
This way let his curling heads 
Fall into our new-made beds ; 
This way let his wanton spawns 
Frisk, and glide it o'er the lawns. 
This way profit comes, and gain : 
How he tumbles here amain ! 
How his waters haste to fall 
Into our channels ! Labour, all, 
And let him in ; let Nilus flow, 
And perpetual plenty shew. 
With incense let us bless the brim, 
And, as the wanton fishes swim, 
Let us gums and garlands fling, 
And loud our timbrels ring. 

Come, old father, come away! 

Our labour is our holiday. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 141 

Enter Nilus. 

Isis. Here comes the aged river now, 

With garlands of great pearl his brow 
Begirt and rounded. In his flow 
All things take life, and all things grow : 
A thousand wealthy treasures still, 
To do him service at his will, 
Follow his rising flood, and pour 
Perpetual blessings on our store. 
Hear him ; and next there will advance 
His sacred heads to tread a dance, 
In honour of my royal guest: 
Mark them too ; and you have a feast. 
Nilus. Make room for my rich waters' fall, 

And bless my flood ; 
Nilus comes flowing to you all 

Encrease and good. 
Now the plants and flowers shall spring, 
And the merry ploughman sing : 
In my hidden waves I bring 
Bread and wine, and everything. 
Let the damsels sing me in, 

Sing aloud, that I may rise : 
Your holy feasts and hours begin, 
And each hand bring a sacrifice. 
Now my wanton pearls I shew, 
That to ladies' fair necks grow ; 

Now my gold, 
And treasures that can ne'er be told, 
Shall bless this land, by my rich flow ; 
And after this, to crown your eyes, 
My hidden holy heads arise. 



142 Songs from the Dramatists, 

Htfyt Stttle jFrencf) Hatoger^ 



SONG IN THE WOOD. 

CHIS way, this way come, and hear, 
You that hold these pleasures dear 5 
Fill your ears with our sweet sound, 
Whilst we melt the frozen ground. 
This way come -, make haste, oh, fair ! 
Let your clear eyes gild the air ; 
Come, and bless us with your sight ; 
This way, this way, seek delight ! 



STJje STrasetrg of Uakntimatu 



THE LUSTY SPRING. 



nOW the lusty spring is seen ; 
Golden yellow, gaudy blue, 
Daintily invite the view. 
Everywhere on every green, 
Roses blushing as they blow, 
And enticing men to pull, 
Lilies whiter than the snow, 
Woodbines of sweet honey full ; 
All love's emblems, and all cry, 
' Ladies, if not plucked, we die.' 

Yet the lusty spring hath stayed, 

Blushing red and purest white 

Daintily to love invite 
Every woman, every maid. 
Cherries kissing as they grow, 

And inviting men to taste, 
Apples even ripe below, 

Winding gently to the waist : 
All love's emblems, and all cry, 
' Ladies, if not plucked, we die.' 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 143 



HEAR WHAT LOVE CAN DO. 

TE^EAR, ye ladies that despise, 

-*V What the mighty love has done ; 

Fear examples, and be wise : 

Fair Calisto was a nnn ; 
Leda, sailing on the stream 

To deceive the hopes of man, 
Love accounting but a dream, 

Doated on a silver swan ; 
Danae, in a brazen tower, 
Where no love was, loved a shower. 

Hear, ye ladies that are coy, 

What the mighty love can do ; 
Fear the fierceness of the boy : 

The chaste moon he makes to woo j 
Vesta, kindling holy fires, 

Circled round about with spies, 
Never dreaming loose desires, 

Doting at the altar dies ; 

Ilion, in a short hour, higher 
He can build, and once more fire. 



J&onstatr Stomas* 1 



THE MAID IN THE WINDOW. 

mY man Thomas 
Did me promise, 
He would visit me this night. 

I am here, love j 
Tell me, dear, love, 
How I may obtain thy sight. 

Come up to my window, love 5 

Come, come, come ! 

1 By Fletcher. 



144 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Come to my window, my dear ; 
The wind nor the rain 
Shall trouble thee again, 

But thou shalt be lodged here. 



Hfyz Ctmnces. 1 



AN INVOCATION. 

/TOME away, thou lady gay: 
V Hoist ! how she stumbles ! 
Hark how she mumbles. 
Dame Gillian ! 
Answer. — I come, I come. 

By old Claret I enlarge thee, 
By Canary thus I charge thee, 
By Britain Metheglin, and Peeter, 2 
Appear and answer me in metre ! 

Why, when? 

Why, Gill! 

Why when? 
Answer. — You'll tarry till I am ready. 

Once again I conjure thee, 

By the pose in thy nose, 

And the gout in thy toes 5 

By thine old dried skin, 

And the mummy within ; 

By thy little, little ruff, 

And thy hood that's made of stuff ; 

By thy bottle at thy breech, 

And thine old salt itch j 

1 Ascribed to Fletcher. the grape from the Khine.— See 

2 An abbreviation of Peter-see- note by Mr. Dyce, from Hender- 
me, itself a corruption of Pedro- son's History of Wines -Works of 
Ximenes, derived from Pedro- Si- Beaumont and Fletcher, vii. 297. 
mon, who is said to have imported Ximenes is still a well-known wine. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 145 

By the stakes, and the stones, 
That have worn out thy bones, 

Appear, 

Appear, 

Appear ! 
Answer. — Oh, I am here ! 



2Tt>e aSloong 3Srott)er ; ov 4 3£loUo, 3Bufte of 
Normantog. 1 



A DRINKING SONG. 

DRINK to-day, and drown all sorrow, 
You shall perhaps not do it to-morrow : 
Best, while you have it, use your breath ; 
There is no drinking after death. 

Wine works the heart up, wakes the wit, 
There is no cure 'gainst age but it : 
It helps the head-ach, cough, and ptisick, 
And is for all diseases physick. 

Then let us swill, boys, for our health ; 
Who drinks well, loves the commonwealth. 2 
And he that will to bed go sober 
Falls with the leaf, still in October. 8 

1 The sole authorship of this play dramatist.— Wooer suggests either 

by Fletcher is doubtful, although W. Rowley or Middleton. 

ascribed to him on the title-page of 2 This defence of drinking is re- 

the edition of 1640. Parts of it are peated and expanded in a song by 

supposed, on internal evidence, to Shadwell. 
have been written by some other 

3 The following well-known catch, or glee, is formed on this song : 
• He who goes to bed, and goes to bed sober. 
Falls as the leaves do, and dies in October ; 
But he who goes to bed, and goes to bed mellow, 
lives as he ought to do, and dies an honest fellow.' 



146 Songs from the Dramatists. 



SONG OF THE YEOMAN OF THE CELLAR, THE BUTLER, THE 
COOK, AND PAUL THE PANTLER » GOING TO EXECUTION. 

Yeoman. 

/70ME, Fortune's a jade, I care not who tell her, 
V Would offer to strangle a page of the cellar, 
That should by his oath, to any man's thinking, 
And place, have had a defence for his drinking ; 
But thus she does still when she pleases to palter, — 
Instead of his wages, she gives him a halter. 

Chorus. 

Three merry boys, and three merry boys, 

And three merry boys are we, 
As ever did sing in a hempen string 

Under the gallows tree ! 

Butler. 

But I that was so lusty, 

And ever kept my bottles, 
That neither they were musty, 

And seldom less than pottles ; 
For me to be thus stopped now, 

With hemp instead of cork, sir, 
And from the gallows lopped now, 

Shews that there is a fork, sir, 
In death, and this the token ; 

Man may be two ways killed, 
Or like the bottle broken, 

Or like the wine be spilled. 

Chorus. — Three merry boys, &c. 

CooTc. 

Oh, yet but look 
On the master cook, 

1 The Pantler was the servant who had charge of the pantry. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 147 

The glory of the kitchen, 

In sewing whose fate, 

At so lofty a rate, 
No tailor e'er had stitch in ; 
For, though he made the man, 

The cook yet makes the dishes, 
The which no tailor can, 

Wherein I have my wishes, 
That I, who at so many a feast 

Have pleased so many tasters, 
Should now myself come to be dressed, 

A dish for you, my masters. 

Chorus. — Three merry boys, &e. 

Pantler. 

Oh, man or beast, 

Or you, at least, 
That wears or brow or antler, 

Prick up your ears 

Unto the tears 
Of me, poor Paul the Pantler, 

That thus am clipped 

Because I chipped 
The cursed crust of treason 

With loyal knife : — 

Oh, doleful strife, 
To hang thus without reason ! 

Chorus. — Three merry boys, &c. 

TAKE, OH! TAKE THOSE LIPS AWAY. 

CAKE, oh ! take those lips away, 
That so sweetly were forsworn, 
And those eyes, like break of day, 

Lights that do mislead the morn ! 
But my kisses bring again, 
Seals of love, though sealed in vain. 
Hide, oh, hide those hills of snow, 
Which thy frozen bosom bears, 



148 Songs from the Dramatists. 

On whose tops the pinks that grow 

Are yet of those that April wears ! 
But first set my poor heart free, 
Bound in those icy chains by thee. 1 



m VffliU for a jJttonttK 2 



TO THE BLEST EVANTHE. 

LET those complain that feel Love's cruelty, 
And in sad legends write their woes ; 
With roses gently h' has corrected me, 
My war is without rage or blows ; 
My mistress' eyes shine fair on my desires, 
And hope springs up inflamed with her new fires. 

No more an exile will I dwell, 

With folded arms, and sighs all day, 
Reckoning the torments of my hell, 
And flinging my sweet joys away : 
I am called home again to quiet peace ; 
My mistress smiles, and all my sorrows cease. 

1 The first stanza of this song is nelius Gallus. The following are 
found in Measure for Measure.— the corresponding passages, which 
See ante, p. 95. The origin of hoth discover a resemblance too close to 
verses may be traced to the frag- have been merely accidental : 
ment Ad Lydiam, ascribed to Cor- 

' Pande, Puella, genas roseas, 

Perfusas rubro purpureas tyriae. 
Porrige labra, labra corallina ; 
Da columbatim mitia basia : 
Sugis amentis partem animi.— 
Sinus expansa prof ert cinnama ; 

Undique surgunt ex te deliciae. 
Conde papillas, quae me sauciant 
Candore, et luxu nivei pectoris.' 
The English version of the second of Secundus, is still nearer to 
of these passages, by the translator Fletcher's song. 
' Again, above its envious rest, 
See, thy bosom heaves confest! 
Hide the rapturous, dear delight ! 
Hide it from my ravished sight ! 
Hide it !— for through all my soul 
Tides of maddening rapture roll.' 
2 By Fletcher. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 149 

Yet, what is living in her eye, 

Or being blessed with her sweet tongue, 
If these no other joys imply? 
A golden gyve, a pleasing wrong : 
To be your own but one poor month, I'd give 
My youth, my fortune, and then leave to live. 



THE SONG OF THE DEAD HOST. 

>7"V[S late and cold ; stir up the fire ; 
^ Sit close, and draw the table nigher ; 
Be merry, and drink wine that's old, 
A hearty medicine 'gainst a cold : 
Your beds of wanton down the best, 
Where you shall tumble to your rest ; 
I could wish you wenches too, 
But I am dead, and cannot do. 
Call for the best the house may ring, 
Sack, white, and claret, let them bring, 
And drink apace, while breath you have ; 
You'll find but cold drink in the grave : 
Plover, partridge, for your dinner, 
And a capon for the sinner, 
You shall find ready when you're up, 
And your horse shall have his sup : 
Welcome, welcome, shall fly round, 
And I shall smile, though under ground. 



&$e ^Ujjrtm. 



D« 



NEPTUNE COMMANDING STILLNESS ON THE SEA. 

I OWN, ye angry waters all ! 
Ye loud whistling whirlwinds, fall ! 
Down, ye proud waves ! ye storms, cease ! 
I command ye, be at peace ! 

1 One of the pieces left unfinished another writer— supposed to be 
by Fletcher, and completed by Shirley, or Massinger. 

2 Ascribed to Fletcher. 



150 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Fright not with your churlish notes, 
Nor bruise the keel of bark that floats j 
No devouring fish come nigh, 
Nor monster in my empery 
Onee show his head, or terror bring ; 
But let the weary sailor sing: 
Amphitrite with white arms 
Strike my lute, I'll sing thy charms. 



2Tt>e Obtain. 1 



THE CATECHISM OF LOVE. 

CELL me, dearest, what is love ? 
'Tis a lightning from above } 
'Tis an arrow, 'tis a fire, 
'Tis a boy they call Desire. 
'Tis a grave, 
Gapes to have 
Those poor fools that long to prove. 

Tell me more, are women true •? 
Yes, some are, and some as you. 
Some are willing, some are strange, 
Since you men first taught to change. 
And till troth 
Be in both, 
All shall love, to love anew. 

Tell me more yet, can they grieve ? 
Yes, and sicken sore, but live, 
Ajad be wise, and delay, 
When you men are as wise as they. 
Then I see, 
Faith will be, 
Never till they both believe. 2 

1 The Prologue speaks of only both Beaumont and Fletcher,— the 
one author,— one writer of com- rest to Fletcher alone, 
mendatory verses ascribes it to 2 The music of this song was 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 151 



THE INVITATION. 

/70ME hither, you that love, and hear me sing 

V^ Of joys still growing, 

Green, fresh, and lusty as the pride of spring, 

And ever blowing. 
Come hither, youths that blush, and dare not know 

What is desire ; 
And old men, worse than you, that cannot blow 

One spark of fire ; 
And with the power of my enchanting song, 
Boys shall be able men, and old men young. 

Come hither, you that hope, and you that cry ; 

Leave off complaining ; 
Youth, strength, and beauty, that shall never die, 

Are here remaining. 
Come hither, fools, and blush you stay so long 

From being blessed ; 
And mad men, worse than you, that suffer wrong, 

Yet seek no rest ; 
And in an hour, with my enchanting song, 
You shall be ever pleased, and young maids long. 

composed by Kobert Jones. The The Knight of the Burning Pestle, 
first two verses are repeated in with some variations. 

'Tell me, dearest, what is love? 
'Tis a lightning from above ; 
'Tis an arrow, 'tis a fire ; 
"Tis a boy they call Desire. 
'Tis a smile 
Doth begnile 
The poor hearts of men that prove. 

Tell me more, are women true? 
Some love change, and so do you. 
Are they fair, and never kind? 
Yes, when men turn with the wind. 
Are they fro ward? 
Ev.er toward 
Those that love, to love anew.' 



152 Songs from the Dramatists. 

2Tt»e <0uieen of (Eormtj)* 1 

A ' SAB SONG.' 

7TVEEP no more, nor sign, nor groan, 
U*J Sorrow calls no time that's gone : 
Violets plucked, the sweetest rain 
Makes not fresh nor grow again f 
Trim thy locks, look cheerfully ; 
Fate's hidden ends eyes cannot see : 
Joys as winged dreams fly fast, 
Why should sadness longer last ? 
Grief is but a wound to woe ; 
Gentlest fair, mourn, mourn no mo. 

Sfje Hmjjfjt of tf)e fuming $estk. 



THE HEALTHINESS OF MIRTH. 

'T^IS mirth that fills the veins with blood, 
^ More than wine, or sleep, or food ; 
Let each man keep his heart at ease ; 
No man dies of that disease. 
He that would his body keep 
From diseases, must not weep 5 
But whoever laughs and sings, 
Never he his body brings 
Into fevers, gouts, or rheums, 
Or lingeringly his lungs consumes ; 
Or meets with aches in his bone, 
Or catarrhs, or griping stone : 
But contented lives for aye ; 
The more he laughs, the more he may. 

1 Ascribed to Fletcher. his ballad of Hie Friar of Orders 

2 This most exquisite passage is Grey : 
thns embodied by Bishop Percy in 

' Weep no more, lady, wee,p no more ; 

Thy sorrow is in vain : 
For Tiolets plucked the sweetest showers 
Will ne'er make grow again.' 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 153 

DIRGE FOR THE FAITHFUL LOVER. 

/TOME, you whose loves are dead, 
V And, whiles I sing, 

Weep, and wring 
Every hand and every head 
Bind with cypress and sad yew ; 
Ribbons black and candles blue 
For him that was of men most true. 

Come with heavy moaning, 

And on his grave 

Let him have 
Sacrifice of sighs and groaning ; 
Let him have fair flowers enow, 
White and purple, green and yellow, 
For him that was of most men true ! 

LIVE WELL AND BE IDLE. 

I WOULD not be a serving-man 
To carry the cloak-bag still, 
Nor would I be a falconer 

The greedy hawks to fill ; 
But I would be in a good house, 
And have a good master too ; 
But I would eat and drink of the best, 
And no work would I do. 

JILLIAN OF BERRY. 

FOR Jillian of Berry, she dwells on a hill, 
And she hath good beer and ale to sell, 
And of good fellows she thinks no ill, 
And thither will we go now, now, now, 

And thither we will go now. 
And when you have made a little stay, 
You need not ask what is to pay, 
But Mss your hostess, and go your way ; 
And thither, &c. 



7a 



154 Songs from the Dramatists. 

THE SONG OP MAY-DAY. 

LONDON, to thee I do present 
The merry month of May ; 
Let each true subject be content 

To hear me what I say : 
For from the top of conduit-head, 

As plainly may appear, 
I will both tell my name to you, 

And wherefore I came here. 
My name is Ralph, by due descent, 

Though not ignoble I, 
Yet far inferior to the flock 

Of gracious grocery ; 
And by the common counsel of 

My fellows in the Strand, 
With gilded staff and crossed scarf, 

The May-lord here I stand. 
Rejoice, oh, English hearts, rejoice ! 

Rejoice, oh, lovers dear! 
Rejoice, oh, city, town, and country, 

Rejoice eke every shire ! 
For now the fragrant flowers do spring 

And sprout in seemly sort, 
The little birds do sit and sing, 

The lambs do make fine sport ; 
And now the birchen-tree doth bud, 

That makes the schoolboy cry ; 
The morris rings, while hobby-horse 

Doth foot it f eateously ; 
The lords and ladies now abroad, 

For their disport and play, 
Do kiss sometimes upon the grass, 

And sometimes in the hay. 
Now butter with a leaf of sage 

Is good to purge the blood ; 
Fly Venus and phlebotomy, 

For they are neither good ! 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 155 

Now little fish on tender stone 

Begin to cast their bellies, 
And sluggish snails, that erst were mewed, 

Do creep out of their sheUies ; 
The rumbling rivers now do warm, 

For little boys to paddle j 
The sturdy steed now goes to grass, 

And up they hang his saddle ; 
The heavy hart, the blowing buck, 

The rascal, and the pricket, 
Are now among the yeoman's pease, 

And leave the fearful thicket ; 
And be like them, oh, you, I say, 

Of this same noble town, 
And lift aloft your velvet heads, 

And slipping off your gown, 
With bells on legs, and napkins clean 

Unto your shoulders tied, 
With scarfs and garters as you please, 

And ' Hey for our town ! ' cried, 
March out and shew your willing minds, 

By twenty and by twenty, 
To Hogsdon, or to Newington, 

Where ale and cakes are plenty ; 
And let it ne'er be said for shame, 

That we the youths of London 
Lay thrumming of our caps at home, 

And left our custom undone. 
Up, then, I say, both young and old, 

Both man and maid a-inaying, 
With drums and guns that bounce aloud, 

And merry tabor playing ! 
Which to prolong, God save our king, 

And send his country peace, 
And root out treason from the land ! 

And so, my friends, I cease. 



156 Songs from the Dramatists. 

LET THE MILL GO ROUND. 

"T^OW having leisure, and a happy wind, 
-*■* Thou mayst at pleasure cause the stones to grind ; 
Sails spread, and grist have ready to be ground ; 
Fy, stand not idly, but let the mill go round ! 

How long shall I pine for love ? 

How long shall I sue in vain ? 
How long like the turtle-dove, 

Shall I heavily thus complain ? 
Shall the sails of my love stand still ? 

Shall the grist of my hopes be unground ? 
Ohfy, ohfy, ohfy! 

Let the mill, let the mill go round ! 

fflWonroi ^leasetr, 

THE SLEEPING BEAUTY. 

OH, fair sweet face ! oh, eyes celestial bright, 
Twin stars in heaven, that now adorn the night ! 
Oh, fruitful lips, where cherries ever grow, 
And damask cheeks, where all sweet beauties blow ! 
Oh thou, from head to foot divinely fair ! 
Cupid's most cunning net's made of that hair ; 
And, as he weaves himself for curious eyes, 
1 Oh me, oh me, I'm caught myself ! ' he cries : 
Sweet rest about thee, sweet and golden sleep, 
Soft peaceful thoughts your hourly watches keep, 
Whilst I in wonder sing this sacrifice, 
To beauty sacred, and those angel eyes ! 



WHAT WOMEN MOST DESIRE. 

Question. TTELL me what is that only thing 
■*■ For which all women long ; 
Yet having what they most desire, 
To have it does them wrong ? 

1 The joint production of Fletcher and W. Rowley. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 157 

Answer, 'Tis not to be chaste, nor fair, 
(Such gifts malice may impair,) 
Richly trimmed, to walk or ride, 
Or to wanton unespied ; 
To preserve an honest name, 
And so to give it up to fame ; 
These are toys. In good or ill 
They desire to have their will : 
Yet, when they have it, they abuse it, 
For they know not how to use it. 1 



<£uj)iti's 3&ebenge. 



SACRIFICE TO CUPID. 

/70ME, my children, let your feet 

V In an even measure meet, 

And your cheerful voices rise, 

To present this sacrifice 

To great Cupid, in whose name, 

I his priest begin the same. 

Young men, take your loves and kiss ; 

Thus our Cupid honoured is ; 

Kiss again, and in your kissing 

Let no promises be missing ; 

Nor let any maiden here 

Dare to turn away her ear 

Unto the whisper of her love, 

But give bracelet, ring, or glove, 

As a token to her sweeting, 

Of an after secret meeting. 

Now, boy, sing, to stick our hearts 

Fuller of great Cupid's darts. 

1 This solution of the question Is But Chaucer spares the ladies the 

to he found in the Wife of Bath's ungallant commentary with which 

Tale, and, douhtless, was a com- the song closes. 
mon saw from time immemorial. 



158 Songs from the Dramatists. 



LOVERS, REJOICE! 

LOVERS, rejoice ! your pains shall be rewarded, 
The god of love himself grieves at your crying 5 
No more shall frozen honour be regarded, 
Nor the coy faces of a maid denying. 
No more shall virgins sigh, and say, 'We dare not, 
' For men are false, and what they do they care not.' 
All shall be well again j then do not grieve ; 
Men shall be true, and women shall believe. 

Lovers, rejoice ! what you shall say henceforth, 
When you have caught your sweethearts in your arms, 
It shall be counted oracle and worth ; 
No more faint-hearted girls shall dream of harms, 
And cry, ' They are too young' ; the god hath said, 
Fifteen shall make a mother of a maid ; 
Then, wise men, pull your roses yet unblown ; 
Love hates the too ripe fruit that falls alone. 



PRAYER TO CUPID. 

/7UPID, pardon what is past, 

V And forgive our sins at last ! 

Then we will be coy no more, 

But thy deity adore j 

Troths at fifteen we will plight, 

And will tread a dance each night, 

In the fields, or by the fire, 

With the youths that have desire. 

Given ear-rings we will wear, 

Bracelets of our lovers' hair, 

Which they on our arms shall twist, 

With their names carved on our wrists ; 

All the money that we owe 1 

We in tokens will bestow : 

1 Own— possess. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 159 

And learn to write that, when 'tis sent, 
Only our loves know what is meant. 

Oh, then pardon what is past, 

And forgive our sins at last ! 



©De STtoo Nofcle Jtfnsmen* 1 



A BRIDAL SONG. 

HOSES, their sharp spines being gone, 
Not royal in their smells alone, 
But in their hue ; 
Maiden-pinks, of odour faint, 
Daisies smell-less, yet most quaint, 
And sweet thyme true j 

Primrose, first-born child of Ver, 
Merry spring-time's harbinger, 

With her bells dim : 
Oxlips in their cradles growing, 
Marigolds on death-beds blowing, 

Lark-heels trim. 

All, dear Nature's children sweet, 
Lie 'fore bride and bridegroom's feet, 

Blessing their sense ! 
Not an angel of the air, 
Bird melodious, or bird fair, 

Be absent hence ! 

The crow, the slanderous cuckoo, nor 
The boding raven, nor chough hoar, 2 

1 Stated in the first 4to edition, respond to the rhyme and the sense. 
1634, to be the joint production of There is some difficulty in accept- 
Fletcher and Shakespeare. ing the original reading. Clough 

2 In the old editions, this line means a break or valley in the side 



runs— of a hill, and the poet is here enu- 

.T i e,om J1 graven, n „ro.oagh ll e i . £££&£? to 
Mr. Seward altered it as above, to the bride-house. 



160 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Nor chattering pie, 
May on our bride-house perch or sing, 
Or with them any discord bring, 

But from it fly ! 



THE DIRGE OF THE THREE KINGS. 

URNS and odours bring away! 
Vapours, sighs, darken the day ! 
Our dole more deadly looks than dying ; 
Balms, and gums, and heavy cheers, 
Sacred vials filled with tears, 
And clamours through the wild air flying ! 

Come all sad and solemn shows, 
That are quick-eyed Pleasure's foes ! 
We convent nought else but woes. 



THE JAILOR'S DAUGHTER. 

FOR I'll cut my green coat, a foot above my knee ; 
And I'll clip my yellow locks, an inch below mine eye. 
Hey, nonny, nonny, nonny. 
He's buy me a white cut, forth for to ride, 
And I'll go seek him through the world that is so wide : 
Hey, nonny, nonny, nonny. 



&$e &ffi?omati*2£ater. 



INVOCATION TO SLEEP. 

/TOME, Sleep, and, with thy sweet deceiving, 

V Lock me in delight awhile ; 

Let some pleasing dreams beguile 
All my fancies ; that from thence 
I may feel an influence, 

All my powers of care bereaving ! 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 161 

Though but a shadow, but a sliding, 

Let me know some little joy ! 

We that suffer long annoy 

Are contented with a thought, 

Through an idle fancy wrought : 
Oh, let my joys have some abiding ! 



£t)e Nice Valour; or, Efje passionate Jllaimtaii, 1 



LOVE, SHOOT MORE! 

THOU deity, swift- winged Love, 
Sometimes below, sometimes above, 
Little in shape, but great in power ; 
Thou that makest a heart thy tower, 
And thy loop-holes ladies' eyes, 
From whence thou strikest the fond and wise ; 
Did all the shafts in thy fair quiver 
Stick fast in my ambitious liver, 
Yet thy power would I adore, 
And call upon thee to shoot more, 
Shoot more, shoot more ! 



LOVE, SHOOT NO MAID AGAIN.' 

OH, turn thy bow ! 
Thy power we feel and know j 
Fair Cupid, turn away thy bow ! 
They be those golden arrows, 
Bring ladies all their sorrows j 
And 'till there be more truth in men, 
Never shoot at maid again ! 

1 Ascribed to Fletcher. 



162 Songs from the Dramatists, 



MELANCHOLY. 

r^ENCE, all you vain delights, 
■*■/ As short as are the nights 

Wherein yon spend your folly ! 
There's nought in this life sweet, 
If man were wise to see't, 

But only melancholy, 

Oh, sweetest melancholy ! 
Welcome, folded arms, and fixed eyes, 
A sight that piercing mortifies, 
A look that's fastened to the ground, 
A tongue chained up without a sound ! 
Fountain heads, and pathless groves, 
Places which pale passion loves! 
Moonlight walks, when all the fowls 
Are warmly housed, save bats and owls ! 

A midnight bell, a parting groan ! 

These are the sounds we feed upon ; 
Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley, 
Nothing's so dainty sweet as lovely melancholy. 



THE PASSIONATE LORD. 

A CURSE upon thee, for a slave ! 
Art thou here, and heardst me rave ? 
Fly not sparkles from mine eye, 
To shew my indignation nigh ? 
Am I not all foam and fire, 
With voice as hoarse as a town-crier ? 
How my back opes and shuts together 
With fury, as old men's with weather ! 
Couldst thou not hear my teeth gnash hither ? 
Death, hell, fiends, and darkness ! 
I will thrash thy mangy carcase. 
There cannot be too many tortures 
Spent upon those lousy quarters. 



Beaumont and Fletcher. 163 

Thou nasty, scurvy, mungrel toad, 

Mischief on thee ! 

Light upon thee 
All the plagues that can confound thee, 
Or did ever reign abroad ! 
Better a thousand lives it cost, 
Than have brave anger spilt or lost. 



LAUGHING SONG. 
[For several voices.] 

OH, how my lungs do tickle ! ha, ha, ha, 
Oh, how my lungs do tickle ! ho, ho, ho, ho ! 

Set a sharp jest 

Against my breast, 
Then how my lungs do tickle ! 

As nightingales, 

And things in cambric rails, 
Sing best against a prickle. 1 

Ha, ha, ha, ha ! 

Ho, ho, ho, ho, ho ! 
Laugh! Laugh! Laugh! Laugh! 
Wide ! Loud ! And vary ! 
A smile is for a simpering novice, 

One that ne'er tasted caviare, 
Nor knows the smack of dear anchovies. 

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha ! 

Ho, ho, ho, ho, ho ! 
A giggling waiting wench for me, 
That shows her teeth how white they be ! 

1 A multitude of examples might Fletcher assigns a reason for the 
be cited of the use of this favourite painful pose of the nightingale 
allusion hy the old poets. Giles while she is singing : 

* Ne ever lets sweet rest invade her eyes, 

But leaning on a thorn her dainty chest, 
For fear soft sleep should steal into her breast, 
Expresses in her song grief not to be expressed.' 

Christ' 8 Victory. 



164 Songs from the Dramatists. 

A thing not fit for gravity, 
For theirs are foul and hardly three. 
Ha, ha, ha ! 
Ho, ho, ho ! 
Democritus, thou ancient fieerer, 

How I miss thy laugh, and ha' since ! ' 
There thou named the famous [est] jeerer, 

That e'er jeered in Rome or Athens. 
Ha, ha, ha ! 
Ho, ho, ho. 
How brave lives he that keeps a fool, 

Although the rate be deeper ! 
But he that is his own fool, sir, 

Does live a great deal cheaper. 
Sure I shall burst, burst, quite break, 

Thou art so witty. 
'Tis rare to break at court, 

For that belongs to the city. 
Ha, ha ! my spleen is almost worn 

To the last laughter, 
Oh, keep a corner for a friend ; 

A jest may come hereafter. 




THOMAS MIDDLETON. 
1570—1627. 
Mr. Dyce conjectures that Thomas Middleton was born 
about 1570. His father was settled in London, where the 
poet was born. The materials gathered for his biography 
are scanty. He seems to have been admitted a member of 
Gray's Inn, to have been twice married, and to have con- 
tributed numerous pieces to the stage, sometimes in eon- 

1 Changed by Seward to 

• How I miss thy laugh, and ha-sense.' 
The change helps little towards clearing up the obscurity. 



Thomas Middleton. 165 

nection with several of his contemporaries. He was ap- 
pointed, in 1620, Chronologer to the City of London, and 
'Inventor of its honourable Entertainments.' In 1624, the 
Spanish ambassador having complained to the King that 
the persons of the King of Spain, Conde de Gondomar, and 
others were represented upon the stage in ' a very scandal- 
ous comedy ' called A Game at Chess, written by Middleton, 
the author and the actors were cited before the Privy Coun- 
cil. The actors appeared, and pleaded that the piece had 
been produced under the usual sanction of the Master of 
the Eevels ; but Middleton, ' shifting out of the way, and 
not attending the board with the rest,' was ordered to be 
arrested, and a warrant was issued for his apprehension. 
The play was in the meanwhile suppressed, and for a cer- 
tain time the actors were prohibited from appearing. Mid- 
dleton afterwards submitted, but no further punishment 
appears to have been inflicted. At this time, Middleton 
resided at Newington Butts, where he died in 1627. 

Middleton may be fairly assigned a distinguished position 
amongst the dramatists of his period. His most conspicu- 
ous characteristics are a rich and natural humour and a 
poetical imagination. Nor was he deficient in passionate 
energy and pathos, although inferior in these qualities to 
some of his contemporaries. 



3Slurt, faster ©onstahle; 1 or, m%t Spaniards 
WtgD^toalft* 

[First printed in 1602.] 



WHAT LOVE IS LIKE. 

LOVE is like a lamb, and love is like a lion ; 
Fly from love, he fights j fight, then does he fly on; 
Love is all on fire, and yet is ever freezing ; 
Love is much in winning, yet is more in leesing : 2 

1 A proverbial phrase. 2 Losing. 



166 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Love is ever sick, and yet is never dying ; 
Love is ever true, and yet is ever lying ; 
Love does doat in liking, and is mad in loathing -, 
Love indeed is anything, yet indeed is nothing. 

pity, pity, pity! 

piTY, pity, pity! 
*_ Pity, pity, pity! 
That word begins that ends a true-love ditty, 
Your blessed eyes, like a pair of suns, 

Shine in the sphere of smiling ; 
Your pretty lips, like a pair of doves, 
Are kisses still compiling. 
Mercy hangs upon your brow like a precious jewel : 
0, let not then, 
Most lovely maid, best to be loved of men, 
Marble He upon your heart, that will make you cruel ! 
Pity, pity, pity! 
Pity, pity, pity! 
That word begins that ends a true-love ditty. 

CHERRY LIP AND WANTON EYE. 

LOVE for such a cherry lip 
Would be glad to pawn his arrows: 
Venus here to take a sip 
Would sell her doves and team of sparrows. 
But they shall not so ; 

Hey nonny, nonny no ! 
None but I this life must owe j 
Hey nonny, nonny no ! 

Did Jove see this wanton eye, 

Ganymede must wait no longer ; 
Phoebe here one night did He, 1 

Would change her face and look much younger. 

1 Mr. Dyce changes the line to— 

' Did Phoebe here one night lie,' 
obtaining the sense at the cost of the melody. 



Thomas Middleton. 167 

But they shall not so ; 

Hey nonny, nonny no 
None but I this life must owe ; 

Hey nonny, nonny no ! 



SI i&ato fflffltorlu, ms Rasters* 
[Licensed and first printed in 1608.] 







BACCHANALIAN CATCH. 

FOR a bowl of fat canary, 

Eich Aristippus, sparkling sherry! 

Some nectar else from Juno's dairy; 

these draughts would make us merry! 

for a wench ! I deal in faces, 
And in other daintier things ; 
Tickled am I with her embraces ; 
Fine dancing in such fairy rings ! 

O for a plump, fat leg of mutton, 
Veal, lamb, capon, pig, and coney ! 
None is happy but a glutton, 
None an ass, but who wants money. 

Wines, indeed, and girls are good ; 
But brave victuals feast the blood ; 
For wenches, wine, and lusty cheer, 
Jove would come down to surfeit here. 1 

1 The authorship of this song is -written hy either Lyly or Middle- 
doubtful. It was printed for the ton ; hut, if hy either, the evidenco 
first time in the Alexander and is in favor of the latter, as Lyly 
Campaspe of Lyly appended to the was dead many years hefore 1632, 
edition of 1632, and is not to be when the song was first printed, 
found in the earlier editions, the and Middleton was certainly alive 
first of which appeared in 1584. a few years before that time. Mr. 
That it did not originally belong to Dyce, who prints it at the end of 
A Mad World, my Masters, is clear Middleton's play from the edition 
from this circumstance, the first of 1640, does not appear to have 
edition of that play having been been aware that it had previously 
published in 1608; but it was add- been printed in Lyly's Alexander 
ed to the second edition in 1640. and Campaspe. 
The probability is that it was not 



168 Songs from the Dramatists. 

E$z OTitcf), 

THE THEEE STATES OF WOMAN. 

IN a maiden- time professed, 
*■ Then we say that life is blessed; 
Tasting once the married life, 
Then we only praise the wife ; 
There's but one state more to try, 
Which make's women laugh or cry — 
Widow, widow : of these three 
The middle's best, and that give me. 

HECATE AND THE WITCHES. 

Voices above. /TOME away, come away, 

V^ Hecate, Hecate, come away. 
Hecate. I come, I come, I come, I come, 
With all the speed I may, 
With all the speed I may. 
Where's Stadlin S 
Voice above. Here. 

Hecate. Where's Puckle f 
Voice above. Here. 

And Hoppo too, and Hellwain too ; 
We lack but you, we lack but you ; 
Come away, make up the count. 
Hecate. I will but 'noint, and then I mount. 
[A spirit like a cat descends. 
Voice above. There's one comes down to fetch his dues. 
A kiss, a coll, a sip of blood ; 
And why thou stayest so long 

I muse, I muse, 
Since the air's so sweet and good. 
Hecate. 0, art thou come ! 

What news, what news ? 
Spirit. All goes still to our delight: 
Either come, or else 
Eefuse, refuse. 
Hecate. Now I'm furnished for the flight. 



Thomas Middleton. 169 

Now I go, now I fly, 

MalMn my sweet spirit and I. 

O what a dainty pleasure 'tis 

To ride in the air 

When the moon shines fair, 

And sing and dance, and toy and Mss ! 

Over woods, high rocks, and mountains, 

Over seas, our mistress' fountains, 

Over steeples, towers, and turrets, 

We fly by night, 'mongst troops of spirits : 

No ring of bells to our ears sounds, 

No howls of wolves, no yelps of hounds ; 

No, not the noise of water's breach, 

Or cannon's throat our height can reach. 

THE CHARM. 

BLACK spirits and white, red spirits and gray, 
Mingle, mingle, mingle, you that mingle may ! 
Titty, Tiflin, 
Keep it stiff in ; 
Firedrake, Puckey, 
Make it lucky ; 
Liard, Robin, 
You must bob in. 
Round, around, around, about, about ! 
All ill come running in, all good keep out ! 
Here's the blood of a bat. 
Put in that, put in that ! 
Here's libbard's bane. 
Put in again ! 

The juice of toad, the oil of adder ; 
Those will make the younker madder. 
Put in — there's all — and rid the stench. 
Nay, here's three ounces of the red-haired wench. 
Round, around, around, about, about ! 1 

1 The similarity between these doubt that Shakespeare borrowed 
passages and the witch scenes in from Middleton, or Middleton from 
Macbeth is too close to admit of a Shakespeare. Which play was pro- 



170 Songs from the Dramatists. 



[In 1623 this comedy was entered by Sir Henry Herbert as an ' old 
play.' It was first printed in 1657.] 



SONG OF THE GIPSIES. 

/70ME, my dainty doxies, 

V My dells, l my dells most dear ; 

We have neither house nor land, 

Yet never want good cheer. 

We never want good cheer. 

We take no care for candle rents, 
We lie, we snort, we sport in tents, 
Then rouse betimes and steal our dinners. 
Our store is never taken 
Without pigs, hens, or bacon, 
And that's good meat for sinners ; 
At wakes and fairs we cozen 
Poor country folk by dozen j 
If one have money, he disburses ; 
Whilst some tell fortunes, some pick purses ; 
Rather than be out of use, 
We'll steal garters, hose, or shoes, 
Boots, or spurs with gingling rowels, 
Shirts or napkins, smocks or towels. 
Come live with us, come live with us, 

duced first is an open question, ceded Mm), because his witches 
Steevens and Gilford assign the are distinguished from those of 
priority to Middleton, Malone to Middleton hy essential differences. 
Shakespeare. Mr. Dyce ohjects to This is quite true. But it should 
Mr. Gilford that he adduces no he ohserved that it is not in these 
evidence to show that the WiteJi essential differences, which lie in 
was anterior to Macbeth ; hut, so the elements of character, and not 
far as his own opinion is concerned, in forms of expression, that the re- 
leaves the question where he found semhlance consists; and that the 
it. I>amh, in a subtle and discrim- fact of direct imitation in the con- 
inating criticism, says that the co- ception and poetical treatment of 
incidence does not detract much the Charms and Incantations re- 
from the originality of Shakespeare mains unaffected. 
( supposing Middleton to have pre- 1 A cant term for an undefiled girl. 



Middleton and Rowley. 171 

All you that love your eases ; 
He that's a gipsy 
May be drunk or tipsy 
At any hour he pleases. 
We laugh, we quaff, we roar, we scuffle ; 
We cheat, we drab, we filch, we shuffle. 

& @t>aste i&ai& in Gr&eajmfoe* 

[First printed in 1630.] 
THE PARTING OF LOVERS. 

7TYEEP eyes, break heart ! 
^*^ My love and I must part. 
Cruel fates true love do soonest sever ; 
O, I shall see thee never, never, never ! 

O, happy is the maid whose life takes end 
Ere it knows parent's frown or loss of friend ! 
Weep eyes, break heart ! 
My love and I must part. 



THOMAS MIDDLETON AND WILLIAM ROWLEY. 

William Rowley was an actor in the Prince of Wales's 
company in the reign of James I. In addition to some plays 
of which he was the sole author, his name appears attached 
to several others, in conjunction with those of Middleton, 
Webster, Massinger, Thomas Heywood, Day, Wilkins, Ford, 
and Fletcher ; and in one instance Shakespeare is said to 
have assisted him. 

2Tf)e Slants!) ^Kipsg, 

[This piece was played at court about 1623 or 1624, but the date of its 
first production in the theatre is not known. It was first printed 

in 1653.] 

GIPSIES. 

T^RIP it, gipsies, trip it fine, 
^ Show tricks and lofty capers ; 



172 Songs from the Dramatists. 

At threading-needles 1 we repine, 
And leaping over rapiers : 

Pindy pandy rascal toys ! 
We scorn cutting purses ; 

Though we live by making noise, 
For cheating none can curse us. 

Over high ways, over low, 

And over stones and gravel, 
Though we trip it on the toe, 

And thus for silver travel ; 
Though our dances waste our backs, 

At night fat capons mend them, 
Eggs well brewed in buttered sack, 

Our wenches say befriend them. 

Oh that all the world were mad ! 

Then should we have fine dancing j 
Hobby-horses would be had 

And brave girls keep a-prancing ; 
Beggars would on cock-horse ride, 

And boobies fall a-roaring ; 
And cuckolds, though no horns be spied, 

Be one another goring. 

Welcome, poet, to our ging! 2 

Make rhymes, we'll give thee reason, 
Canary bees thy brains shall sting, 

Mull-sack did ne'er speak treason j 
Peter-see-me 3 shall wash thy nowl, 

And Malaga glasses fox thee ; 
If, poet, thou toss not bowl for bowl, 

Thou shalt not kiss a doxy. 

1 An old pastime. 2 Gang. 3 See Note, p. 144. 



Middleton and Rowley. 173 



THE GIPSY ROUT. 

{TOME, follow your leader, follow, 

V Our convoy be Mars and Apollo ; 

The van comes brave up here ; 

As hotly conies the rear. 

Our knackers are the fifes and drums, 
Sa, sa, the gipsies' army comes ! 

Horsemen we need not fear, 
There's none but footmen here ; 
The horse sure charge without ; 
Or if they wheel about, 

Our knackers are the shot that fly, 

Pit-a-pat rattling in the sky. 

If once the great ordnance play, 

That's laughing, yet run not away, 

But stand the push of pike, 

Scorn can but basely strike ; 

Then let our armies join and sing, 
And pit-a-pat make our knackers ring. 

Arm, arm ! what bands are those ? 

They cannot be sure our foes ; 

We'll not draw up our force, 

Nor muster any horse j 

For since they pleased to view our sight, 
Let's this way, this way, give delight. 

A council of war let's call, 

Look either to stand or fall j 

If our weak army stands, 

Thank all these noble hands ; 

Whose gates of love being open thrown, 
We enter, and then the town's our own. 



174 Songs from the Dramatists. 



THE GIPSY'S OATH. 

T^HY best hand lay on this turf of grass, 
^ There thy heart lies, vow not to pass 
From us two years for sun nor snow, 
For hill nor dale, howe'er winds blow ; 
Vow the hard earth to be thy bed, 
"With her green cushions under thy head ; 
Flower-banks or moss to be thy board, 
Water thy wine — and drink like a lord. 

Kings can have but coronations ; 

We are as proud of gipsy fashions ; 

Dance, sing, and in a well-mixed border, 

Close this new brother of our order. 

What we get with us come share, 
You to get must vow to care ; 
Nor strike gipsy, nor stand by 
When strangers strike, but fight or die ; 
Our gipsy -wenches are not common, 
You must not kiss a fellow's leman ; 
Nor to your own, for one you must, 
In songs send errands of base lust. 

Dance, sing, and in a well-mixed border 
Close this new brother of our order. 

Set foot to foot ; those garlands hold, 

Now mark [well] what more is told ; 

By cross arms, the lover's sign, 

Vow as these flowers themselves entwine, 

Of April's wealth building a throne 

Bound, so your love to one or none ; 

By those touches of your feet, 

You must each night embracing meet, 

Chaste, howe'er disjoined by day; 

You the sun with her must play, 

She to you the marigold, 

To none but you her leaves unfold ; 



Middleton and Rowley. 175 

Wake she or sleep, your eyes so charm, 
Want, woe, nor weather do her harm. 
This is your market now of kisses, 
Buy and sell free each other blisses. 

Holidays, high days, gipsy-fairs, 

When kisses are fairings, and hearts meet in pairs. 



THE GIPSY LIFE. 

BRAVE Don, cast your eyes on our gipsy fashions : 
In our antique hey de guize 1 we go beyond all 
nations ; 
Plump Dutch at us grutch, so do English, so do French; 
He that lopes 2 on the ropes, show me such another 
wench. 

We no camels have to show, nor elephant with growt 3 
head; 

We can dance, he cannot go, because the beast is corn- 
fed ; 

No blind bears, shedding tears, for a collier's whipping; 

Apes nor dogs, quick as frogs, over cudgels skipping. 

Jacks-in-boxes, nor decoys, puppets, nor such poor 

things, 
Nor are we those roaring boys that cozen fools with 

gilt rings; 4 
For an ocean, not such a motion as the city Nineveh, 
Dancing, singing, and fine ringing, you these sports 

shall hear and see. 



1 A country dance. person likely to do swindled into 

2 Leaps. 3 Great. the purchase of them. It is one 
4 Ring-dropping, a gulling trick, of the cheats upon countrymen 

which consisted in dropping a described by Sir John Pi elding, in 

paper of brass rings, washed over the last century, in his Extracts 

with gold, on the pavement, and from the Penal Laws, and is still 

picking it up in the presence of a practised in the streets of London. 



176 Songs from the Dramatists. 

BEN JONSON, FLETCHEE, AND MTDDLETON. 
{Acted about 1616. First printed 1652.] 



THE THIEVES* SONG. 

COW round the world goes, and every thing that's 

*/ in it! 

The tides of gold and silver ebb and flow in a minute : 

Prom the usurer to his sons, there a current swiftly 
runs; 

From the sons to queans in chief, from the gallant to 
the thief; 

From the thief unto his host, from the host to husband- 
men; 

From the country to the court ; and so it comes to us 
again. 

How round the world goes, and everything that's in it; 

The tides of gold and silver ebb and flow in a minute. 



THOMAS DEKKEE. 

An industrious dramatist hi the reign of James I., chiefly 
distinguished by having been engaged in a literary quarrel 
with Ben Jonson, who satirized him under the name of 
Crispinus, an indignity for which Dekker took ample revenge 
in his SaUro-masUx ; or, the Untrussing of a Humorous Poet. 
Dekker must not be estimated from Jonson's character of 
him. He wrote a great number of plays, and was joined 
in several by "Webster, Ford, and others. His pieces are 
remarkably unequal. His plots are not always well chosen, 
and are generally careless in construction. But in occa- 
sional scenes he rises to an unexpected height of power, 
and exhibits a range of fancy that fairly entitles him to 
take rank with the majority of his contemporaries. 



T. DeMer and E. Wilson. Ill 

<©la JFortuttatus* 

[First printed in 1600.] 



VIRTUE AND VICE. 

VIRTUE'S branches wither, virtue pines, 
pity ! pity ! and alack the time ! 
Vice doth flourish, vice in glory shines, 
Her gilded boughs above the cedar climb. 

Vice hath golden cheeks, O pity, pity ! 
She in every land doth monarchize : 
Virtue is exiled from every city, 
Virtue is a fool, Vice only wise. 

pity, pity ! Virtue weeping dies ! 
Vice laughs to see her faint, alack the time ! 
This sinks ; with painted wings the other flies ; 
Alack, that best should fall, and bad should climb. 

O pity, pity, pity ! mourn, not sing ; 
Vice is a saint, Virtue an underling ; 
Vice doth flourish, Vice in glory shines, 
Virtue's branches wither, Virtue pines. 



T. DEKKER AND R. WILSON. 

Wilson was an actor of humorous parts, and one of the 
boon companions over the ' Mermaid wine,' alluded to by 
Beaumont, in his verses to Ben Jonson : 

' Filled with such moisture, in most grievous qualms 
Did Robert Wilson write his singing psalms.' 

He was considered by Meres one of the best comedy- 
writers of his time. He wrote, however, only one entire 
piece, The Cobbler's Prophecy ; but assisted Chettle, Dekker, 
and others in the composition of several. 
8a 



178 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Z$z Stjocmafeer's ^oliHaj ; or, Clje (&cntU 
Craft. |594- 



THE SnOEER S QUEEX. 

OTHE month of May, the merry month of May. 
5 So froliek, so gay. and so green, so green, so 
0, and then did I unto my true love say, [green ! 

Sweet Peg, thou shalt be my Summer's Queen. 

Now the nightingale, the pretty nightingale, 
The sweetest singer in all the forest's quire, 
Entreats thee, sweet Peggy, to hear thy true love's tale : 
Lo, yonder she sitteth, her breast against a brier. 

But 0, I spy the cuckoo, the cuckoo, the cuckoo ; 
See where she sitteth ; come away, my joy : 
Come away. I prithee, I do not like the cuckoo 
Should sing where my Peggy and I kiss and toy. 

0, the month of May. the merry month of May, 
So froliek, so gay, and so green, so green, so green ; 
And then did I unto my true love say, 
Sweet Peg, thou shalt be my Summer's Queen. 

SATS'T HUGH ! 

n OLD'S the wind, and wet's the rain, 
V Saint Hugh be our good speed! 
El is the weather that bringeth no gain, 
Nor helps good hearts in need. 

Troll the bowl, the jolly nut-brown bowl, 

And here kind mate to thee ! 
Let's sing a dirge for Saint Hugh's soul, 

And down it merrily. 

Down-a-down. hey, down-a-down, 
Hey deny deny down-a-down. 

Ho ! well done, to me let come, - 
Ring compass, gentle joy ! 



DeMer, Chettle, and Haughton. 179 

Troll the bowl, the nut-brown bowl, 

And here kind, &c. 

Cold's the wind, and wet's the rain, 

Saint Hugh ! be our good speed j 
111 is the weather that bringeth no gain, 

Nor helps good hearts in need. 




THOMAS DEKKER, HENRY CHETTLE, AND 
WILLIAM HAUGHTON. 

The names of Chettle and Haughton are attached to a 
great number of plays, generally in conjunction with those 
of other writers. It is difficult to determine their respective 
merits ; but as far as any speculation may be founded upon 
such evidence of their independent labours as can be traced 
with certainty, Chettle had a more serious vein than 
Haughton, whose special force lay in comedy. How this 
joint authorship was conducted, we have no means of ascer- 
taining. The likelihood is that in most cases there was one 
principal writer, with whom the subject may have origi- 
nated, and that when he had completed his design, either 
as a sketch or a finished work, the others filled in, added, 
retrenched, or altered. If there be any weight in this sup- 
position, the largest share in the comedy of Patient Grissell 
should perhaps be assigned to Dekker, whose name stands 
first of the three in the entry acknowledging a payment 
in earnest of the play, in Henslowe's Diary. 

The story of Patient Grissell was first thrown into a nar- 
rative shape by Boccaccio ; and the earliest drama on the 
subject was brought upon the stage by the French, in 1393. 
About 1538, Richard Radcliffe, a schoolmaster in Hert- 
fordshire, wrote a play called Patient Griselde, founded on 
Boccaccio, of which nothing has survived but the name. 
Dekker and his coadjutors may probably have been to some 



180 Songs from the Dramatists. 

extent indebted to Radeliffe's production. The story, how- 
ever, was well-known, and existed in other shapes ; Chaucer 
having long before rendered it familiar to English readers 
in the Canterbury Tales. The date of the receipt in Hen- 
slowe's Diary — 19 December, 1599 — determines the date 
of the play from which the following songs are derived. 



£|ie pleasant Comtfm of patient <£rfsssll. 



SWEET CONTENT. 

ART thon poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers ? 
Oh, sweet content ! 
Art thou rich, yet is thy mind perplexed ? 

Oh. punishment ! 
Dost thou laugh to see how fools are vexed 
To add to golden numbers, golden numbers ? 
0, sweet content ! 0, sweet, <fce. 

Work apace, apace, apace, apace ; 
Honest labour bears a lovely face ; 
Then hey noney, noney, hey noney, noney. 

Canst drink the waters of the crisped spring ? 
0, sweet content ! 
Swimmest thou in wealth, yet sinkest in thine own 
0, punishment ! [tears ? 

Then he that patiently want's burden bears, 
No burden bears, but is a king, a king ! 
0, sweet content ! fcc. 

"Work apace, apace, &c. 

LULLABY. 

GOLDEN slumbers kiss your eyes, 
Smiles awake you when you rise. 
Sleep, pretty wantons ; do not cry, 
And I will sing a lullaby : 
Rock them, rock them, lullaby. 



John Webster. 181 

Care is heavy, therefore sleep you ; 
You are care, and care must keep you. 
Sleep, pretty wantons ; do not cry, 
And I will sing a lullaby : 
Rock them, rock them, lullaby. 

BEAUTY, ARISE! 

BEAUTY, arise, shew forth thy glorious shining ; 
Thine eyes feed love, for them he standeth pining ; 
Honour and youth attend to do their duty 
To thee, their only sovereign beauty. 
Beauty, arise, whilst we, thy servants, sing, 
Io to Hymen, wedlock's jocund king. 
Io to Hymen, Io, Io, sing, 
Of wedlock, love, and youth, is Hymen king. 

Beauty, arise, thy glorious lights display, 
Whilst we sing Io, glad to see this day. 

Io, Io, to Hymen, Io, Io, sing, 

Of wedlock, love, and youth, is Hymen king. 




JOHN WEBSTER. 

In passionate energy and intensity of expression Webster 
resembles Marston and transcends him. He had a pro- 
founder dramatic power, and possessed a command over the 
sources of terror which none of our dramatists have exhib- 
ited so effectively. ' To move a terror skilfully,' observes 
Lamb, ' to touch a soul to the quick, to lay upon fear as 
much as it can bear, to wear and weary a life till it is ready 
to drop, and then step in with mortal instruments to take its 
last forfeit : this only a Webster can do. Writers of an 
inferior genius may 'upon horror's head horrors accumu- 
late,' but they cannot do this. They mistake quantity for 
quality, they ' terrify babies with painted devils,' but they 



182 Songs from the Dramatists. 

know not how a soul is capable of being moved ; their 
terrors want dignity, their affrightments are without deco- 
rum. This criticism refers specially to the Dacliess of Malfy, 
but indicates generally that peculiar quality of Webster's 
genius which chiefly distinguishes him from his contem- 
poraries. 

The earliest notice of Webster occurs in 1602. He is 
said to have been clerk of St. Andrew's, Holborn, and a 
member of the Merchants Tailors' Company; but Mr. Dyce 
could not discover any trace of his name, although he 
searched the registers of the church, and the MSS. belong- 
ing to the Parish Clerk's Hall. In tracing, in his collected 
edition of Webster's works, the order of his productions, 
and examining every collateral question of authorship likely 
to throw any light upon his identity, Mr. Dyce has supplied 
all the information that can be obtained respecting him. 
It relates almost exclusively to his writings. His personal 
history is buried in obscurity. 



£i)e WS%\Xz 29ebil; or. Ttttoria ©oromfcona, 16)2. 



A DIRGE. 



fJAHL for the robin-redbreast and the wren, 

V Since o'er shady groves they hover, 

And with leaves and flowers do cover 

The friendless bodies of unburied men. 

Call unto his funeral dole 

The ant, the field-mouse, and the mole, 

To rear him hillocks that shall keep him warm, 

And (when gay tombs are robbed) sustain no harm j 

But keep the wolf far thence, that's foe to men, 

For with his nails he'll 1 dig them up again. 

1 ' I never saw anything like this of the earth, earthy. Both have 

Dirge, except the Ditty which re- that intenseness of feeling, which 

minds Ferdinand of his drowned seems to resolve itself into the 

Father in the Tempest. As that elements which it contemplates.' 

is of the water, watery ; so this is —Lamb. 



John Webster. 183 

a^e Bucfjess of if&alfg* J623. 



THE MADMAN'S SONG. 

OLET us howl some heavy note, 
J Some deadly dogged howl, 
Sounding, as from the threatning throat 

Of beasts and fatal fowl ! 
As ravens, screech-owls, bulls and bears, 

We'll bell, and bawl our parts, 
'Till irksome noise have cloyed your ears, 

And corrosived your hearts, 
At last, whenas our quire wants breath, 

Our bodies being blessed, 
We'll sing, like swans, will welcome death, 
And die in love and rest. 



THE PREPARATION FOR EXECUTION. 

T^ARK, now everything is still, 

-*-/ The screech-owl, and the whistler shrill, 

Call upon our dame aloud, 

And bid her quickly don her shroud ! 

Much you had of land and rent ; 

Your length in clay's now competent : 

A long war disturbed your mind ; 

Here your perfect peace is signed. 

Of what is't fools make such vain keeping ? 

Since their conception, their birth weeping, 

Their life a general mist of error, 

Their death, a hideous storm of terror. 

Strew your hair with powders sweet, 

Don clean linen, bathe your feet, 

And (the foul fiend more to check,) 

A crucifix let bless your neck : 

'Tis now full tide 'tween night and day ; 

End your groan, and come away. 



184 Songs from the Dramatists. 

JOHN WEBSTER AND WILLIAM EOWLEY. 
W$z SEfjraciati ffl^otitier. J 661. 



woman's love. 

LOVE is a law, a discord of such force, 
That 'twixt our sense and reason makes divorce ; 
Love's a desire, that to obtain betime, 
We lose an age of years plucked from our prime ; 
Love is a thing to which we soon consent, 
As soon refuse, but sooner far repent. 

Then what must women be, that are the cause 
That love hath life? that lovers feel such laws? 
They're like the winds upon Lepanthse's shore, 
That still are changing : O, then love no more ! 
A woman's love is like that Syrian flower, 
That buds, and spreads, and withers in an hour. 



LOVE MUST HAVE LOVE. 

I CARE not for those idle toys, 
That must be wooed and prayed to. 
Come, sweet love, let's use the joys 
That men and women used to do. 

The first man had a woman 
Created for his use you know ; 
Then never seek so close to keep 
A jewel of a price so low. 

Delay in love's a lingering pain, 
That never can be cured ; 
Unless that love have love again, 
'Tis not to be endured. 



Webster and Rowley. 185 

THE PURSUIT OF LOVE. 

ART thou gone in haste ? 
I'll not forsake thee ; 
Runnest thou ne'er so fast, 

I'll overtake thee : 
Over the dales, over the downs, 
Through the green meadows, 
From the fields through the towns, 
To the dim shadows. 

All along the plain, 

To the low fountains, 
Up and down again 

From the high mountains ; 
Echo then shall again 

Teh her I follow, 
And the floods to the woods, 

Carry my holla, holla ! 

Ce! la! ho! ho! hu! 

THE SONG OP JANUARY. 

nOW does jolly Janus greet your merriment ; 
For since the world's creation, 
I never changed my fashion ; 
'Tis good enough to fence the cold : 
My hatchet serves to cut my firing yearly, 
My bowl preserves the juice of grape and barley ; 
Fire, wine, and strong beer, make me live so long here 
To give the merry new year a welcome in. 

All the potent powers of plenty wait upon 

You that intend to be frolic to-day : 

To Bacchus I commend ye, and Ceres eke attend ye, 

To keep encroaching cares away. 

That Boreas' blasts may never blow to harm you ; 

Nor Hyems' frost, but give you cause to warm you : 

Old father Janevere drinks a health to all here, 

To give the merry new year a welcome in. 



186 Songs from the Dramatists. 



THE DEPARTURE OF JANUARY. 

CT INCE you desire my absence ; 
^P I will depart this green ; 
Though loath to leave the presence 

Of such a lovely queen ; 
Whose beauty, like the sun, 

Melts all my frost away ; 
And now, instead of winter, 

Behold a youthful May. 

HOMAGE TO LOVE. 

LOVE'S a lovely lad 
His bringing-up is beauty ; 
Who loves him not is mad, 
For I must pay him duty ; 
Now I'm sad. 

Hail to those sweet eyes, 
That shine celestial wonder ; 

From thence do flames arise, 
Burn my poor heart asunder. 
Now it fries. 

Cupid sets a crown 

Upon those lovely tresses ; 
0, spoil not with a frown 

What he so sweetly dresses ! 
I'll sit down. 



HEIGH, HEIGHO! 

7TVHITHER shall I go, 
^*^ To escape your folly ? 
For now there's love I know, 
Or else 'tis melancholy : 

Heigh, heigho ! 



Webster and Eowley. 187 

Yonder lies the snow, 

But my heart cannot melt it : 
Love shoots from his bow, 

And my poor heart hath felt it. 
Heigh, heigho ! 

I'll never love more. 

OSTAY, turn, pity me, 
That sighs, that sues for love of thee ! 
lack ! I never loved before j 
If you deny, I'll never love more. 

No hope, no help ! then wretched I 
Must lose, must lack, must pine, and die ; 
Since you neglect when I implore. 
Farewell, hard, I'll ne'er love more. 

BEWARE OF LOVE. 

CHERE is not any wise man, 
That fancy can a woman j 
Then never turn your eyes on 
A thing that is so common : 
For be they foul or fair, 
They tempting devils are, 
Since they first fell ; 
They that love do live in hell, 
And therefore, men, beware. 

OUT UPON YE ALL ! 

FOOLISH, idle toys, 
That nature gave unto us, 
But to curb our joys, 
And only to undo us ; 
For since Lucretia's fall, 
There are none chaste at all ; 
Or if perchance there be 
One in an empery, 



188 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Some other malady 
Makes her far worse than she. 
Out upon ye all ! 

'Twere too much to tell 
The follies that attend ye ; 
He must love you well 
That can but discommend ye ; 
For your deserts are such, 
Man cannot rail too much ; 
Nor is the world so blind, 
But it may easily find 
The body, or the mind, 
Tainted in womankind. 

0, the devil take you all ! 

INVOCATION TO APOLLO. 

FAIR Apollo, whose bright beams 
Cheer all the world below : 
The birds that sing, the plants that spring, 
The herbs and flowers that grow : 
0, lend thy aid to a swain sore oppressed, 
That his mind 
Soon may find 
The delight that sense admits ! 
And by a maid let his harms be redressed, 
That no pain 
Do remain 
In his mind to offend his wits ! 




SAMUEL ROWLEY. 
One of the players in the establishment of the Prince of 
Wales, and included in the list of Henslowe's authors. His 
principal pieces are the play from which the following song 
is taken, and a comedy called When you see me you know me. 
He also assisted other writers in some of the Moral Plays. 



Thomas Goffe. 189 

2T|)e Nofcle Spanisf) Sol&fer. J 634. 



SORROW. 

OH, sorrow, sorrow, say where dost thou dwell 
In the lowest room of hell. 
Art thou born of human race ? 
No, no, I have a furier face. 
Art thou in city, town, or court ? 

I to every place resort. 
Oh, why into the world is sorrow sent <? 

Men afflicted best repent. 
What dost thou feed on ? 

Broken sleep. 
What takest thou pleasure in ? 
To weep, 

To sigh, to sob, to pine, to groan, 
To wring my hands, to sit alone. 
Oh when, oh when shall sorrow quiet have ? 
Never, never, never, never. 
Never till she finds a grave. 



THOMAS GOFFE. 
1592—1627. 
Thomas Goffe was born in Essex, about 1592, and edu- 
cated at Westminster. In 1609 he entered Christ Church, 
Oxford, and having had the degree of bachelor of divinity 
conferred upon him, was preferred to the living of East 
Clandon, in Surrey, in 1623. He is said to have been a 
professed woman-hater, yet, notwithstanding, married the 
wife of his predecessor, who revenged the wrongs of the 
whole sex upon him by the violence of her temper, and 
finally, it is supposed, shortened his life. He died in 1627. 
He was the author of four dramas, and is believed in the 
latter part of his life to have embraced the church of Rome. 



190 Songs from the Dramatists. 



NURSE'S SONG. 

LULLABY, lullaby, baby, 
Great Argos' joy, 
The King of Greece thou art born to be, 
In despite of Troy. 
Rest ever wait upon thy head, 
Sleep close thine eyes, 
The blessed guard tend on thy bed 

Of deities. 
O, how this brow will beseem a crown ! 
How these locks will shine ! 
Like the rays of the sun on the ground, 
These locks of thine ! 
The nurse of heaven will send thee milk ; 
Mayst thou suck a Queen. 
Thy drink love's nectar, and clothes of silk ; 
A god mayst thou seem. 
Cupid sit on this rosean cheek, 

On these ruby lips. 
May thy mind like a lamb be meek, 

In the vales which trips. 
Lullaby, lullaby, baby, &c. 



THE MADNESS OP ORESTES. 

7TYEEP, weep, you Argonauts, 

^*^ Bewail the day 

That first to fatal Troy 

You took your way. 

Weep, Greece, weep, Greece, 

Two kings are dead. 

Argos, thou Argos, now a grave 

Where kings are buried ; 

No heir, no heir is left, 



Thomas Goffe. 191 

But one that's mad. 
See, Argos, hast not thou 
Cause to be sad ? 
Sleep, sleep, wild brain, 
Rest, rock thy sense, 
Live if thou canst 
To grieve for thy offence. 
Weep, weep, you Argonauts ! 



C^e ©areless StjepijertiesH. J 656. 



THE FOLLY OF LOVE. 

DOW fie on love, it ill befits, 
Or man and woman know it, 
Love was not meant for people in their wits, 

And they that fondly show it 
Betray their too much feathered brains, 
And shall have only Bedlam for their pains. 

To love is to distract my sleep, 

And waking to wear fetters ; 
To love is but to go to school to weep ; 

I'll leave it for my betters. 
If single love be such a curse, 
To marry is to make it ten times worse. 

THE TYRANNY OF CUPID. 

BLIND Cupid lay aside thy bow, 
Thou dost not know its use, 
For love, thou tyranny dost show, 
Thy kindness is abuse. 

Thou wert called a pretty boy, 

Art thought a skeleton, 
For thou like death dost still destroy, 

When thou dost strike but one. 



192 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Each, vulgar hand can do as nmch ; 

Thine heavenly skill we see 
When we behold one arrow touch 

Two marks that distant be. 

Love always looks for love again, 
If ever thou wound man's heart, 

Pierce by the way his rib, and then 
He'll kiss, not curse thy dart. 

LOVE WITHOUT RETURN. 

GRIEVE not, fond man, nor let one tear 
Steal from thine eyes ; she'll hear 
No more of Cupid's shafts ; they fly 
For wounding her, so let them die. 
For why shouldst thou nourish such flames as burn 
Thy easy breast, and not have like return H 
Love forces love, as flames expire 
If not increased by gentle fire. 

Let then her frigid coolness move 

Thee to withdraw thy purer love ; 

And since she is resolved to show 

She will not love, do thou so too : 
For why should beauty so charm thine eyes, 
That if she frown, thou'lt prove her sacrifice ? 
Love, &c. 




CHETTLE AND MUNDAY. 
SCJie Beat!) of a&obert, Harl of ^untingtion. 

THE DEATH OF ROBIN HOOD. 

7TVEEP, weep, ye woodmen wail, 
**J Your hands with sorrow wring ; 
Your master Robin Hood lies dead, 
Therefore sigh as you sing. 



Thomas Reywood. 193 

Here lie his primer and his beads, 
His bent bow and his arrows keen, 
His good sword and his holy cross : 
Now cast on flowers fresh and green ; 

And as they fall shed tears and say, 
Wella, wella-day, wella, wella-day : 
Thus cast ye flowers and sing, 
And on to Wakefield take your way. 




THOMAS HEYWOOD. 
15— 16—. 
' Heywood,' says Charles Lamb, 'is a sort of prose Shake- 
speare, his scenes are to the full as natural and affecting. 
But we miss the poet, that which in Shakespeare always 
appears out and above the surface of the nature. Heywood's 
characters, his country gentlemen, &c, are exactly what we 
see (but of the best kind of what we see) in life. Shake- 
speare makes us believe, while we are among his lovely 
creations, that we see nothing but what we are familiar 
with, as in dreams new things seem old ; but we awake, and 
sigh for the difference.' The test to which this comparison 
subjects the writings of Heywood is a severe one ; but he 
comes out of it with credit. Considering how much he 
wrote, and the circumstances under which he appears to 
have written, it is no slight merit to have produced scenes 
as natural and affecting, and characters as true to life as 
those of Shakespeare, even without the power of idealizing 
his conceptions. Of all our dramatic writers he was the 
most voluminous, having been concerned in no less than 
two hundred and twenty dramatic pieces, besides his 
Apology for Actors, and other works. It was only by the 
most persevering and systematic industry such a prodigious 
quantity of labour could have been accomplished, and Kirk- 
9 



194 Songs from the Dramatists. 

man says that he 'not only acted almost every day, but 
obliged himself to write a sheet every day for several years 
together.' Many of his plays were written in this way in 
taverns. ' As one proof of the rapidity of his composition/ 
observes the last editor of Dodsley, ' it may be mentioned 
that at the end of his Nine Books of Various History concern- 
ing Women, a folio of 466 pages, printed in 1624, are the 
following words : Opus excogitatum, inchoatum, explicitum et 
typograplio excusum inter septemdecem septimanas.' We can 
hardly form a just estimate of the various merits of such a 
writer from the scanty evidence that has come down to us, 
twenty-three of his plays being all that are known to exist 
in print. He seems, indeed, to have written his plays solely 
for the stage without any view to publication, and he tells 
us that many of them were lost by the shifting and change 
of companies, that others were retained in the hands of 
the actors, who considered it injurious to their profits to 
suffer them to be printed, that having sold his copies to 
them he thought he had no right to print them without their 
consent, and that, even if he had the right to print them, he 
never had ' any great ambition to be, in this kind, volumin- 
ously read.' 

The earliest notice that has been traced of Thomas Hey- 
wood occurs in Henslowe's Diary under the date of 1596, 
from which it appears that he had at that time written a 
play for the Lord Admiral's company. In 1598 he entered 
Henslowe's company as a regular actor and sharer. On the 
accession of James I., he became one of the theatrical 
servants of the Earl of "Worcester, was afterwards trans- 
ferred to the service of Queen Anne, and upon her Majesty's 
death returned to Lord Worcester. Amongst the numerous 
works he either contemplated or produced was a collection 
of The Lives of all the Poets, Modern and Foreign, upon the 
materials for which he was for many years engaged. Few 
further particulars are known concerning him. We learn 
from an elegy on Sir G-eorge Saint Poole, whom he calls his 
countryman, that he was born in Lincolnshire ; and William 
Cartwright says that he was a fellow of Peter House, in 



Thomas Heywood. 195 

Cambridge, which is in some degree confirmed by an allu- 
sion of his own to ' the time of his residence at Cambridge.' 
The following curious notice of Heywood, in which an 
allusion is made to the poverty under which he suffered at 
one period of his life, if not throughout his whole career of 
labour and struggle, is extracted from a poem on the Times? 
Poets, published by Mr. Halliwell amongst the miscellane- 
ous papers of the Shakespeare Society. It occurs in a very 
scarce volume, bearing the date of 1656, and entitled 
Choyce Drollery, Songs, and Sonnets, being a collection of divers 
excellent pieces of poetry of several eminent authors, never before 
printed : — 

The squabbling Middleton, and Heywood sage, 

The apologetic Atlas of the stage ; 

Well of the Golden Age he conld entreat, 

Bnt little of the metal he conld get ; 

Threescore sweet babes he fashioned from the lump, 

For he was christened in Parnassus' pnmp, 

The Muses gossip to Aurora's bed, 

And ever since that time his face was red. 



ffiije 3&ape of SLucrece* 



WHAT IS LOVE? 

"T\OW what is love I will thee tell, 

*" It is the fountain and the well, 

Where pleasure and repentance dwell : 

It is perhaps the sansing bell, 1 

That rings all in to heaven or hell, 

And this is love, and this is love, as I hear tell. 

Now what is love I will you show : 

A thing that creeps and cannot go ; 

A prize that passeth to and fro ; 

A thing for me, a thing for mo' : 

And he that proves shall find it so, 

And this is love, and this is love, sweet friend, I trow. 

1 Sanctus bell, or Saint's bell, that called to prayers. 



196 Songs from the Dramatists. 



TAVERN SIGNS. 

CHE gentry to the King's Head, 
The nobles to the Crown, 
The knights unto the G-olden Fleece, 
And to the Plough the clown. 
The churchman to the Mitre, 
The shepherd to the Star, 
The gardener hies him to the Rose, 
To the Drum the man of war ; 
To the Feathers, ladies, you ; the Globe 
The sea-man doth not scorn : 
The usurer to the Devil, and 
The townsman to the Horn. 
The huntsman to the White Hart, 
To the Ship the merchants go, 
But you that do the muses love, 
The Sign called River Po. 
The banquerout to the World's End, 
The fool to the Fortune hie, 
Unto the Mouth the oyster wife, 
The fiddler to the Pie. 
The punk unto the Cockatrice, 
The drunkard to the Vine, 
The beggar to the Bush, then meet, 
And with Duke Humphrey dine. 

THE DEATH BELL. 

(70ME, list and hark, the bell doth toll 
Vr* For some but now departing soul. 
And was not that some ominous fowl, 
The bat, the night- crow, or screech-owl ? 
To these I hear the wild wolf howl, 
In this black night that se* ms to scowl. 
All these my black-book death enroll, 
For hark, still, still, the bell doth toll 
For some but now departing soul. 



Thomas Heywood. 197 

SELoWs Ifctstressj ox t SEJje Queen's Basque* 



THE PRAISES OP PAN. 

y^HOU that art called the bright Hyperion, 
^ Wert thou more strong than Spanish Geryon 
That had three heads upon one man, 
Compare not with our great god Pan. 

They call thee son of bright Latona, 
But girt thee in thy torrid zona, 
Sweat, baste and broil, as best thou can ; 
Thou art not like our dripping Pan. 

What cares he for the great god Neptune, 
With all the broth that he is kept in ; 
Vulcan or Jove he scorns to bow to, 
Hermes, or the infernal Pluto. 

Then thou that art the heavens' bright eye, 
Or burn, or scorch, or broil, or fry, 
Be thou a god, or be thou man, 
Thou art not like our frying Pan. 

They call thee Phoebus, god of day, 

Years, months, weeks, hours, of March and May j 

Bring up thy army in the van, 

We'll meet thee with our pudding Pan. 

Thyself in thy bright chariot settle, 
With skillet armed, brass-pot or kettle, 
With jug, black-pot, with glass or can, 
No talking to our warming Pan. 

Thou hast thy beams thy brows to deck, 
Thou hast thy Daphne at thy beck : 
Pan hath his horns, Syrinx, and Phillis, 
And I, Pan's swain, my Amaryllis. 



198 Songs from the Dramatists, 

ffixut $art of 2&fns JEDtoarfc $.V. 



A' 



AGINCOURT. 

GINCOURT, Agincourt ! know ye not Agincourt ' 
Where the English slew and hurt 

AH the French f oemen ? 
With our guns and bills brown, 
Oh, the French were beat down, 

Morris-pikes and bowmen. 



HARVEST-HOME. 

7TTITH fair Ceres, Queen of Grain, 

UJ The reaped fields we roam, roam, roam 

Each country peasant, nymph, and swain, 

Sing their harvest home, home, home ; 
Whilst the Queen of Plenty hallows 
Growing fields, as well as fallows. 

Echo, double all our lays, 

Make the champaigns sound, sound, sound, 
To the Queen of Harvest's praise, 

That sows and reaps our ground, ground, 
Ceres, Queen of Plenty, hallows [ground. 

Growing fields, as well as fallows. 

Stje Jfatr |&attr o{ t$e Hr^anae. 



GO, PRETTY BIRDS. 



YE little birds that sit and sing 
Amidst the shady valleys, 
And see how Phillis sweetly walks, 

Within her garden-alleys ; 
Go, pretty birds, about her bower ; 
Sing, pretty birds, she may not lower ; 
Ah, me ! methinks I see her frown ! 
Ye pretty wantons, warble. 



Thomas Heywood. 199 

Go, tell her, through your chirping bills, 

As you by me are bidden, 
To her is only known my love, 

Which from the world is hidden. 
Go, pretty birds, and tell her so ; 
See that your notes strain not too low, 
For still, methinks, I see her frown, 

Ye pretty wantons, warble. 

Go, tune your voices' harmony, 

And sing, I am her lover ; 
Strain loud and sweet, that every note 

With sweet content may move her. 
And she that hath the sweetest voice, 

Tell her I will not change my choice ; 
Yet still, methinks, I see her frown. 

Ye pretty wantons, warble. 

Oh, fly ! make haste ! see, see, she falls 

Into a pretty slumber. 
Sing round about her rosy bed, 

That waking, she may wonder. 
Say to her, 'tis her lover true 
That sendeth love to you, to you ; 
And when you hear her kind reply, 

Eeturn with pleasant warblings. 

& C&allenfle foe 3Seauta?. 

THE NATIONS. 

THE Spaniard loves his ancient slop ; 
A Lombard the Venetian ; 
And some like breechless women go, 
The Russe, Turk, Jew, and Grecian : 

The thrifty Frenchman wears small waist, 
The Dutch his belly boasteth ; 
The Englishman is for them all, 
And for each fashion coasteth. 



200 Songs from the Dramatists. 

The Turk in linen wraps his head. 
The Persian his in lawn too, 
The Russe with sables furs his cap, 
And change will not be drawn to. 

The Spaniard's constant to his block, 
The French inconstant ever ; 
But of all felts that may be felt, 
Give me your English beaver. 

The German loves his coney-wool, 
The Irishman his shag too, 
The Welch his Monmouth loves to wear, 
And of the same will brag too. 

Some love the rough, and some the smooth, 
Some great, and others small things j 
But oh, your liquorish Englishman, 
He loves to deal in all things. 

The Russ drinks quasse; Dutch, Lubeck's beer, 
And that is strong and mighty ; 
The Briton he Metheglen quaffs, 
The Irish aqua vitse. 

The French affects the Orleans grape, 
The Spaniard sips his sherry, 
The English none of these can 'scape, 
But he with all makes merry. 

The Italian in her high chioppine, * 
Scotch lass, and lovely Erse too, 
And Spanish donna, French madam, 
He doth not fear to go to. 

Nothing so full of hazard, dread, 
Nought lives above the centre, 
No health, no fashion, wine or wench, 
On which he dare not venture. 2 

1 Choppine, a clog or patten. 
2 This song is introduced into the Rape »f Lucrece. 



Thomas Heywood. 201 



DIANA'S NYMPHS. 

r^AIL, beauteous Dian, queen of shades, 

A/ That dwell'st beneath these shadowy glades, 

Mistress of all those beauteous maids 

That are by her allowed. 
Virginity we all profess, 
Abjure the worldly vain excess, 
And will to Dian yield no less 

Than we to her have vowed. 
The shepherds, satyrs, nymphs, and fawns, 
For thee will trip it o'er the lawns. 

Come, to the forest let us go, 
And trip it like the barren doe ; 
The fawns and satyrs still do so, 

And freely thus they may do. 
The fairies dance and satyrs sing, 
And on the grass tread many a ring, 
And to their caves their venison bring ; 

And we will do as they. 

The shepherds, satyrs, &c, &c. 

Our food is honey from the bees, 

And mellow fruits that drop from trees ; 

In chace we climb the high degrees 

Of every steepy mountain. 
And when the weary day is past, 
We at the evening hie us fast, 
And after this, our field repast, 

We drink the pleasant fountain. 

The shepherds, satyrs, &c, &c. 



9a 



202 Songs from the Dramatists, 

PHILIP MASSINGER. 

1584—1640. 

The struggle of Massinger's life is pathetically summed 
up in the entry of his burial in the parish register of St. 
Saviour's: 'March 20, 1639-40 — buried Philip Massinger, 
a stranger. ? This entry tells his whole story, its obscurity, 
humiliations, and sorrows. Dying in his house at Bankside, 
in the neighbourhood of the theatre which had been so 
often enriched by his genius, the isolation in which he lived 
is painfully indicated by this touching memorial. Yet there 
is little trace of a resentment against fortune in his writ- 
ings, which are generally marked, on the contrary, by relig- 
ious feeling, and that gentleness and patience of spirit by 
which he is said to have been distinguished in his intercourse 
with his contemporaries. The only passages that have an 
air of discontent are those in which he rails at Mngs, and 
chastises the vices and hollowness of fashionable life and 
its vulgar imitators; but these topics were the common 
property of all the dramatists. Massinger was not so pro- 
found in his development of the stronger passions as he was 
true and chaste in the delineation of quiet emotions and 
ordinary experiences. His vehement tragic bursts some- 
times degenerate into rant ; but his calmer scenes are 
always natural and just. 'He wrote,' observes Lamb, 
'with that equability of all the passions which made his 
English style the purest and most free from violent meta- 
phors and harsh constructions of any of the dramatists who 
were his contemporaries.' 

The dates attached to the plays indicate the years in 
which they were produced upon the stage. 

£f)e ISteturc. j639. 



THE SWEETS OP BEAUTY. 

T^HE blushing rose, and purple flower, 
^ Let grow too long, are soonest blasted 
Dainty fruits, though sweet, will sour. 
And rot in ripeness, left untasted. 



Philip Massinger. 203 

Yet here is one more sweet than these : 
The more you taste the more she'll please. 

Beauty that's enclosed with ice, 

Is a shadow chaste as rare j 
Then how much those sweets entice, 

That have issue full as fair ! 
Earth cannot yield, from all her powers, 
One equal for dame Venus' bowers. 



SCfje JSmptvox ot tjje 3Eaat* J6)3. 



DEATH. 



7TYHY art thou slow, thou rest of trouble, Death, 

U-* To stop a wretch's breath, 

That calls on thee, and offers her sad heart 

A prey unto thy dart ? 
I am nor young nor fair ; be, therefore, bold : 

Sorrow hath made me old, 
Deformed, and wrinkled ; all that I can crave, 

Is quiet in my grave. 
Such as live happy, hold long life a jewel ; 

But to me thou art cruel, 
If thou end not my tedious misery ; 

And I soon cease to be. 
Strike, and strike home, then ; pity unto me, 

In one short hour's delay, is tyranny. 

ST&e (Satartaaiu 1633. 



THE BRIDAL. 

Juno to the Bride. 

GNTER a maid ; but made a bride, 
Be bold and freely taste 
The marriage banquet, ne'er denied 
To such as sit down chaste. 



204 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Though he unloose thy virgin zone, 

Presumed against thy will, 
Those joys reserved to him alone, 

Thou art a virgin still 

Hymen to the Bridegroom. 

Hail, bridegroom, hail ! thy choice thus made, 

As thou wouldst have her true, 
Thou must give o'er thy wanton trade, 

And bid those fires adieu. 
That husband who would have his wife 

To him continue chaste, 
In her embraces spends his life, 

And makes abroad no waste. 

Hymen and Juno. 

Sport then like turtles, and bring forth 

Such pledges as may be 
Assurance of the father's worth, 

And mother's purity. 
Juno doth bless the nuptial bed j 

Thus Hymen's torches burn. 
Live long, and may, when both are dead, 

Your ashes fill one urn ! 



WELCOME TO THE FOREST'S QUEEN. 

7TVELCOME, thrice welcome to this shady green, 
*** Our long- wished Cynthia, the forest's queen, 
The trees begin to bud, the glad birds sing 
In winter, changed by her into the spring. 

We know no night, 

Perpetual light 
Dawns from your eye. 

You being near, 

We cannot fear, 
Though death stood by. 



John Ford. 205 

From you our swords take edge, our heart grows bold j 
From you in fee their lives your liegemen hold. 
These groves your kingdom, and our laws your will ) 
Smile, and we spare; but if you frown, we kill. 

Bless then the hour 

That gives the power 
In which you may, 

At bed and board, 

Embrace your lord 
Both night and day. 
Welcome, thrice welcome to this shady green, 
Our long- wished Cynthia, the forest's queen ! 



JOHN FORD. 
1586—16—. 
While Massinger was fighting against the ills and morti- 
fications of a precarious pursuit, his contemporary Ford, 
two years his junior, was persevering in the profession of 
the law, filling up his leisure hours with dramatic poetry, 
and making an independence, which at last enabled him 
to marry (if the pleasant tradition may be trusted), and to 
spend the last years of his life at ease in his native place. 
He was descended from a family long settled in the north 
of Devonshire, was born in Islington in 1586, and is sup- 
posed to have died about 1640. In the poem on the Times' 
Poets, already quoted, he is described in a characteristic 

couplet : 

' Deep in a dump John Ford was alone got, 
With folded arms and melancholy hat.' 

Whether the 'melancholy hat' really conveys a faithful 
image of the character of the man is questionable, for in the 
roll of worthies enumerated by Heywood in his Hierarchy 
of Angels, we are told that he was always called by the 
familiar name of Jack Ford, which argues a more social and 
genial nature. 



206 Songs from the Dramatists. 

&\je Sun's Barltna* 1 1 623. 

THE REAL AND THE IDEAL. 

FANCIES are but streams 
Of vain pleasure ; 
They, who by their dreams 
True joys measure, 
Feasting starve, laughing weep, 
Playing smart ; whilst in sleep 
Fools, with shadows smiling, 
Wake and find 
Hopes like wind, 
Idle hopes, beguiling. 
Thoughts fly away; Time hath passed them : 
Wake now, awake ! see and taste them ! 

birds' songs. 

7TYH AT bird so sings, yet so does wail •? 

*** 'Tis Philomel, the nightingale ; 

Jugg, jugg, jugg, terue she cries, 

And, hating earth, to heaven she flies. 

Ha, ha ! hark, hark ! the cuckoos sing 
Cuckoo ! to welcome in the Spring. 

Brave prick-song ! who is't now we hear ? 

'Tis the lark's silver leer-a-leer. 

Chirrup the sparrow flies away ; 

For he fell to't ere break of day. 

Ha, ha ! hark, hark ! the cuckoos sing 
Cuckoo ! to welcome in the Spring. 2 

LIVE WITH ME. 

LIVE with me still, and all the measures, 
Played to by the spheres, I'll teach thee ; 
Let's but thus dally, all the pleasures 

The moon beholds, her man shall reach thee. 

1 In this play Ford Tvas joined by Dekker. 

2 Imitated from a song in Lyly's Alexander and Campaspe.—See ante, 
p. 50. 



John Ford. 207 

Dwell in mine arms, aloft we'll hover, 

And see fields of armies fighting : 
Oh, part not from me ! I'll discover 

There all, but books of fancy's writing. 

Be but my darling, age to free thee 
From her curse, shall fall a-dying ; 

Call me thy empress ; Time to see thee 
Shall forget his art of flying. 

THE DEATH OF SPRING. 

T^ERE lies the blithe Spring, 

A/ Who first taught birds to sing, 
Yet in April herself fell a crying : 

Then May growing hot, 

A sweating sickness she got, 
And the first of June lay a-dying. 

Yet no month can say, 

But her merry daughter May 
Stuck her coffins with flowers great plenty : 

The cuckoo sung in verse 

An epitaph o'er her hearse, 
But assure you the lines were not dainty. 

SUMMER SPORTS. 

T^AYMAKERS, rakers, reapers, and mowers, 
-■•/ Wait on your Summer-queen ; 
Dress up with musk-rose her eglantine bowers, 
Daffodils strew the green ; 
Sing, dance, and play, 
'Tis holiday ; 
The Sun does bravely shine 
On our ears of corn. 
Rich as a pearl 
Comes every girl, 
This is mine, this is mine, this is mine ; 
Let us die, ere away they be borne. 



208 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Bow to the Sun, to our queen, and that fair one 

Come to behold our sports : 
Each bonny lass here is counted a rare one, 
As those in a prince's courts. 
These and we 
With country glee, 
Will teach the woods to resound, 
And the hills with echoes hollow : 
Skipping lambs 
Their bleating dams, 
'Mongst kids shall trip it round j 
For joy thus our wenches we follow. 

Wind, jolly huntsmen, your neat bugles shrilly, 

Hounds make a lusty cry ; 
Spring up, you falconers, the partridges freely, 
Then let your brave hawks fly. 
Horses amain. 
Over ridge, over plain, 
The dogs have the stag in chase : 
? Tis a sport to content a king. 
So ho ho ! through the skies 
How the proud bird flies, 
And sousing kills with a grace ! 
Now the deer falls ; hark; how they ring ! 



DRINKING SONG. 

Q AST away care ; he that loves sorrow 

S^ Lengthens not a day, nor can buy to-morrow j 

Money is trash j and he that will spend it, 

Let him drink merrily, Fortune will send it. 

Merrily, merrily, merrily, Oh, ho ! 

Play it off stiffly, we may not part so. 

Wine is a charm, it heats the blood too, 
Cowards it will arm, if the wine be good too j 



John Ford. 209 

Quickens the wit, and makes the back able, 
Scorns to submit to the watch or constable. 

Merrily, &c. 

Pots fly about, give us more liquor, 
Brothers of a rout, our brains will flow quicker ; 
Empty the cask ; score up, we care not ; 
Fill all the pots again : drink on, and snare not. 

Merrily, &c. 



FLY HENCE, SHADOWS ! 

FLY hence, shadows, that do keep 
Watchful sorrows, charmed in sleep ! 
Though the eyes be overtaken, 
Yet the heart doth ever waken 
Thoughts, chained up in busy snares 
Of continual woes and cares : 
Love and griefs are so expressed, 
As they rather sigh than rest. 
Fly hence, shadows, that do keep 
Watchful sorrows, charmed in sleep. 



Snf)e aSrofcen f^eart. J 633. 



BEAUTY BEYOND THE REACH OF ART. 

Q AN you paint a thought % or number 
V Every fancy in a slumber ? 
Can you count soft minutes roving 
From a dial's point by moving ? 
Can you grasp a sigh ? or, lastly, 
Rob a virgin's honour chastely \ 

No, oh no ! yet you may 

Sooner do both that and this, 
This and that, and never miss, 

Than by any praise display 



210 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Beauty's beauty ; such a glory, 
As beyond all fate, all story, 
All arms, all arts, 
All loves, all hearts, 
Greater than those, or they, 
Do, shall, and must obey. 



BRIDAL SONG. 

/70MFOETS lasting, loves encreasing, 
V Like soft hours never ceasing ; 
Plenty's pleasure, peace complying, 
Without jars, or tongues envying j 
Hearts by holy union wedded, 
More than theirs by custom bedded ; 
Fruitful issues ; life so graced, 
Not by age to be defaced ; 
Budding as the year ensu'th, 
Every spring another youth i. 
All what thought can add beside, 
Crown this Bridegroom and this Bride ! 



LOVE IS EVER DYING. 

OH, no more, no more, too late 
Sighs are spent ; the burning tapers 
Of a life as chaste as fate, 

Pure as are unwritten papers, 
Are burned out : no heat, no light 
Now remains ; 'tis ever night. 
Love is dead j let lover's eyes, 
Locked in endless dreams, 
The extremes of all extremes, 
Ope no more, for now Love dies. 
Now live dies, — implying 
Love's martyrs must be ever, ever dying. 



John Ford. 211 



GLORIES, pleasures, pomps, delights and ease, 
Can but please 
The outward senses, when the mind 
Is or untroubled, or by peace refined. 
Crowns may flourish and decay, 
Beauties shine, but fade away. 
Youth may revel, yet it must 
Lie down in a bed of dust. 
Earthly honours flow and waste, 
Time alone doth change and last. 
Sorrows mingled with contents, prepare 

Rest for care ; 
Love only reigns in death ; though art 
Can find no comfort for a broken heart. 



Stye Half's ©rial. J63S. 



LOSE NOT OPPORTUNITY. 

PLEASURES, beauty, youth attend ye, 
"Whilst the spring of nature lasteth ; 
Love and melting thoughts befriend ye, 
Use the time, ere winter hasteth. 
Active blood, and free delight, 
Place and privacy invite. 
Do, do ! be kind as fair, 
Lose not opportunity for air. 

She is cruel that denies it, 

Bounty best appears in granting ; 
Stealth of sport as soon supplies it, 
"Whilst the dues of love are wanting. 
Here's the sweet exchange of bliss, 
When each whisper proves a kiss. 
In the game are felt no pains, 
For in all the lover gains. 



212 Songs from the Dramatists. 

SIR JOHN SUCKLING. 
1608—1642. 
The animal spirits and gallantry of Suckling are charm- 
ingly sustained in these songs. Nothing in verse can be 
more airy or sparkling. They have in them the brightest 
and finest elements of youth — manliness and gaiety, wit, 
grace, and refinement. In this class of light and sprightly 
lyrics, of which he may be considered the founder, he is 
unrivalled. The comparison between him and Waller is 
infinitely in favour of Suckling, whose ease and vivacity offer 
a striking contrast to the elaborate finish and careful filigree 
of Waller. He writes, also, more like a man of blood and 
high breeding. His luxurious taste and voluptuousness are 
native to him ; while in Waller there is always the effort of 
art, and the consciousness of the fine gentleman. 



THE PINING LOVER. 

7TYHY so pale and wan, fond lover ? 

*** Prithee why so pale f 

Will, when looking well can't move her, 

Looking ill prevail ? 

Prithee why so pale ? 

Why so dull and mute, young sinner ? 

Prithee why so mute ? 
Will, when speaking well can't win her, 

Saying nothing do't ? 

Prithee why so mute ? 

Quit, quit, for shame ; this will not move, 

This cannot take her j 
If of herself she will not love, 

Nothing can make her : 

The devil take her. 



Sir John Suckling. 213 

TRUE LOVE. 

DO, no, fair heretic, it needs must be 
But an ill love in me, 

And worse for thee ; 
For were it in my power 
To love thee now this hour 

More than I did the last ; 
'Twould then so fall, 

I might not love at all ; 
Love that can flow, and can admit increase, 
Admits as well an ebb, and may grow less. 

True love is still the same ; the torrid zones, 

And those more frigid ones 

It must not know : 
For love grown cold or hot, 

Is lust, or friendship, not 

The thing we have. 
For that's a flame would die 
Held down, or up too high : 
Then think I love more than I can express, 
And would love more, could I but love thee less. 

aSrettnoralt. }639. 



A TOAST. 

CT HE'S pretty to walk with : 
^P And witty to talk with : 

And pleasant too to think on. 
But the best use of all 
Is, her health is a stale, * 

And helps us to make us drink on. 

THE VIRTUE OF DRINKING. 

/70ME let the state stay, 
V^ And drink away, 

1 A snare or decoy. 



214 Songs from the Dramatists. 

There is no business above it : 
It warms the cold brain, 
Makes us speak in high strain ; 

He's a fool that does not approve it. 

The Macedon youth 

Left behind him this truth, 

That nothing is done with much thinking ; 
He drunk, and he fought, 
Till he had what he sought, 

The world was his own by good drinking. 



m>t €foI)lma + 1646. 



A CATCH. 

FILL it up, fill it up to the brink, 
When the poets cry clink, 
And the pockets chink, 

Then 'tis a merry world. 
To the best, to the best, have at her, 
And the deuce take the woman-hater: — 
The prince of darkness is a gentleman, 
Mahu, Mahu is his name. 

&!)e <Safc ©ne. 



FICKLE AND FALSE. 

T^AST thou seen the down in the air, 
-*■/ When wanton blasts have tossed it •? 
Or the ship on the sea, 

When ruder winds have crossed it ? 
Hast thou marked the crocodile's weeping, 

Or the fox's sleeping ? 
Or hast thou viewed the peacock in his pride, 

Or the dove by his bride, 

When he courts for his lechery ? 
Oh! so flickle, oh! so vain, oh! so false, so false is she! 



215 



WILLIAM CAKTWKIGHT. 
1611—1643. 
It was of William Cartwright Ben Jonson said, ' My son, 
Cartwright writes like a man.' He has not left much behind 
to justify this eulogium ; but his minor poems exhibit evi- 
dences of taste and scholarship which sufficiently explain 
the esteem and respect in which he was held by his con- 
temporaries. His father, after spending a fortune, was re- 
duced to the necessity of keeping an inn at Cirencester; 
but the son, obtaining a king's scholarship, was enabled to 
enter Westminster School, and from thence was elected a 
student of Christ Church, Oxford. He afterwards went into 
holy orders, and in 1643 was chosen junior proctor of the 
University. He is said to have studied sixteen hours a day, 
was an accomplished linguist, and added to his other graces 
a handsome person. A malignant fever that prevailed at 
Oxford seized upon him in 1643, and terminated his life in 
the thirty-second year of his age. 



®t>e ©rtrtnarg. 



THE PHILOSOPHY OP EATING. 

T^HEN our music is in prime, 
^ When our teeth keep triple time ; 
Hungry notes are fit for knells. 
May lankness be 
No guest to me : 
The bag-pipe sounds when that it swells. 
May lankness, &c. 
A mooting-night brings wholesome smiles, 
When John-a-Nokes and John-a-Stiles 
Do grease the lawyer's satin. 
A reading day 
Frights French away, 
The benchers dare speak Latin. 

A reading, &c. 



216 Songs from the Dramatists. 

He that's full doth verse compose ; 
Hunger deals in sullen prose : 
Take notice and discard her. 
The empty spit 
Ne'er cherished wit ; 
Minerva loves the larder. 

The empty spit, &c. 

First to breakfast, then to dine, 
Is to conquer Bellarmine : 
Distinctions then are budding. 
Old SutclifPs wit 
Did never hit, 
But after his bag-pudding. 

Old SutclifPs wit, &c. 




PHINEAS FLETCHEE. 
1584—1650. 
The author of the Purple Island and the Piscatory Ec- 
logues. His out-of-door poetry is his best, and frequently 
recalls the sweetness and luxuriance of Spenser, and of his 
own namesake and cousin, the dramatic poet. Phineas was 
what honest Walton would have called ' a true brother of 
the nangle,' and his master-passion betrays itself in the 
most unexpected places. It appears even in the characters 
and subject of his only dramatic work, which he describes 
on the title-page as A Piscatory. 

W$t StcdOres. J6J4. 



LOVE is the sire, dam, nurse, and seed 
Of all that air, earth, waters breed. 
All these earth, water, air, and fire, 
Though contraries, in love conspire. 



Phineas Fletcher. 217 

Fond painters, love is not a lad 

With bow, and shafts, and feathers clad, 

As he is fancied in the brain 

Of some loose loving idle swain. 

Much sooner is he felt than seen ; 

Substance subtle, slight and thin, 

Oft leaps he from the glancing eyes ; 

Oft in some smooth mount he lies ; 

Soonest he wins, the fastest flies ; 

Oft lurks he 'twixt the ruddy lips, 

Thence, while the heart his nectar sips, 

Down to the soul the poison slips j 

Oft in a voice creeps down the ear ; 

Oft hides his darts in golden hair ; 

Oft blushing cheeks do light his fires ; 

Oft in a smooth soft skin retires ; 

Often in smiles, often in tears, 

His flaming heat in water bears ; 

When nothing else kindles desire, 

Even virtue's self shall blow the fire. 

Love with a thousand darts abounds, 

Surest and deepest virtue wounds, 

Oft himself becomes a dart, 

And love with love doth love impart. 

Thou painful pleasure, pleasing pain, 

Thou gainful lif e, thou losing gain, 

Thou bitter sweet, easing disease, 

How dost thou by displeasing please ? 

How dost thou thus bewitch the heart, 

To love in hate, to joy in smart, 

To think itself most bound when free, 

And freest in its slavery ? 

Every creature is thy debtor ; 

None but loves, some worse, some better. 
Only in love they happy prove 
Who love what most deserves their love. 



10 



218 Songs from the Dramatists. 

WILLIAM HABINGTON. 

1605—1654. 

William Habington is not generally known as a drama- 
tist. His poetical reputation rests on a volume of verses 
called Castara, divided into three parts, the first and second 
addressed to his wife before and after marriage, and the 
third to religious subjects. The play from which this song 
is taken is his only dramatic work, and the song itself, 
which has something of the nonchalance and freedom of 
Suckling, without his airiness, is the happiest passage it 
contains. 

STfje 4Butsen of gtrragon* 



indifference. 

FINE young folly, though you were 
That fair beauty I did swear, 
Yet you ne'er could reach my heart : 
For we courtiers learn at school, 
Only with your sex to fool ; 
You are not worth the serious part. 

When I sigh and kiss your hand, 
Cross my arms, and wondering stand, 

Holding parley with your eye, 
Then dilate on my desires, 
Swear the sun ne'er shot such fires — 

All is but a handsome lie. 

When I eye your curl or lace, 
G-entle soul, you think your face 

Straight some murder doth commit ; 
And your virtue doth begin 
To grow scrupulous of my sin, 

When I talk to shew my wit. 



Barten Holiday. 219 

Therefore, madam, wear no cloud, 
Nor to check my love grow proud ; 

In sooth I much do doubt, 
'Tis the powder in your hair, 
Not your breath, perfumes the air, 
And your clothes that set you out. 

Yet though truth has this confessed, 
And I vow I love in jest, 

When I next begin to court, 
And protest an amorous flame, 
You will swear I in earnest am : 
Bedlam ! this is pretty sport. 



lJS 



BAETEN HOLIDAY. 

1661. 

Barten Holiday was born in the latter end of the reign 
of Queen Elizabeth, became at an early age a student of 
Christ Church College, Oxford, entered orders in 1615, and 
was appointed archdeacon of the diocese of Oxford. He 
died in 1661. Langbaine says that he was 'a general 
scholar, a good preacher, a skilful philosopher, and an ex- 
cellent poet.' He translated Juvenal and Persius, and pub- 
lished numerous sermons. The singular drama which sup- 
plies the following lively song is allegorical, the characters 
forming a sort of commonwealth of the arts and sciences. 
In order to give the true relish to this vagrant ditty it 
should be observed that it is sung by a humorous serving- 
man, dressed, according to the stage directions, ' in a pale 
russet suit, on the back whereof is expressed one filling a 
pipe of tobacco, his hat set round with tobacco-pipes, with 
a can of drink hanging at his girdle.' 



220 Songs from the Dramatists. 

STcrnotamta ; or, Qfyz J&artiage of t|)e &rts* )630. 

TOBACCO. 

TOBACCO'S a Musician, 
And in a pipe delighteth ; 
It descends in a close, 
Through the organs of the nose, 
With a relish that inviteth. 
This makes me sing So ho, ho ; So ho, ho, boys, 
Ho boys, sound I loudly ; 
Earth ne'er did breed 
Such a jovial weed, 
Whereof to boast so proudly. 
Tobacco is a Lawyer, 
His pipes do love long cases, 
When our brains it enters, 
Our feet do make indentures, 
While we seal with stamping paces. 

This makes me sing, &c. 
Tobacco's a Physician, 

Good both for sound and sickly ; 
'Tis a hot perfume 
That expels cold rheum, 
And makes it flow down quickly. 

This makes me sing, &c. 
Tobacco is a Traveller, 

Come from the Indies hither ; 
It passed sea and land, 
Ere it came to my hand, 
And 'scaped the wind and weather. 

This makes me sing, &c. 
Tobacco is a Critic, 
That still old paper turneth, 
Whose labour and care 
Is as smoke in the air 
That ascends from a rag when it burneth. 

This makes me sing, &c. 



James Shirley, 221 

Tobacco's an ignis fatuus — 

A fat and fiery vapour, 

That leads men about 

Till the fire be out, 

Consuming like a taper. 

This makes me sing, &c. 

Tobacco is a Whimer, 
And cries huff snuff with fury ) 
His pipe's his club and link j 
He's wiser that does drink ; 
Thus armed I fear not a fury. 

This makes me sing, &c. 



JAMES SHIRLEY. 
1596—1666. 

With Shirley terminates the roll of the great writers 
whose works form a distinct era in our dramatic literature. 
He was the last of a race of giants. Born in the reign of 
Elizabeth, he lived to witness the Restoration, and carried 
down to the time of Charles I. the moral and poetical 
elements of the age of Shakespeare. New modes and a new 
language set in with the Restoration ; and the line that sep- 
arates Shirley from his immediate successors is as clearly 
denned and as broadly marked as if a century had elapsed 
between them. 

Shirley was educated at Merchant-Tailors' School, and 
from thence removed to St. John's College, Oxford, which 
he afterwards left to complete his collegiate course at Cam- 
bridge. Having entered holy orders, he was appointed to 
a living at or near St. Albans, in Hertfordshire ; but subse- 
quently renounced his ministry, in consequence of having 
embraced the doctrines of the Church of Rome. For a 
short time he found occupation as a teacher in a grammar- 
school, a life of drudgery which he soon relinquished to 



222 Songs from the Dramatists. 

become a writer for the stage. He produced altogether 
thirty-three plays; and not the least remarkable circum- 
stance connected with them is that, instead of going to 
other sources for his plots, he invented nearly the whole of 
them. Vigour and variety of expression, and richness of 
imagery are amongst his conspicuous merits ; and, making 
reasonable allowance for occasional confusion in the imbro- 
glio of his more complicated fables, arising, no doubt, from 
hasty composition, the action of his dramas is generally con- 
trived and evolved with considerable skill. 

Shirley died in 1666. Wood tells us that the fire of 
London drove him and his wife from their residence near 
Fleet-street into the parish of St. Giles's-in-the-Fields, and 
that the alarm and losses they sustained took so severe an 
effect upon them that they both died on the same day. 

3Lobe Sricfes, J 634. 



SHEPHERDS AND SHEPHERDESSES. 

7TYOODMEN, shepherds, come away, 
^*s This is Pan's great holiday, 

Throw off cares, 
With your heaven-aspiring airs 

Help us to sing, 
While valleys with your echoes ring. 

Nymphs that dwell within these groves 
Leave your arbours, bring your loves, 

Gather posies, 
Crown your golden hair with roses ) 

As you pass 
Foot like fairies on the grass. 

Joy crown our bowers ! Philomel, 
Leave of Tereus' rape to tell. 

Let trees dance, 
As they at Thracian lyre did once ; 

Mountains play, 
This is the shepherds' holiday. 



James Shirley. 223 

STtie mitts ifaic ©tie. )6^S. 

• 

love's hue &kt> cry. 

IN Love's name you are charged hereby 
To make a speedy hue and cry, 
After a face, who t'other day, 
Came and stole my heart away ; 
For your directions in brief 
These are best marks to know the thief : 
Her hair a net of beams would prove, 
Strong enough to captive Jove, 
Playing the eagle j her clear brow 
Is a comely field of snow. 
A sparkling eye, so pure a gray 
As when it shines it needs no day. 
Ivory dwelleth on her nose ; 
Lilies, married to the rose, 
Have made her cheek the nuptial bed ; 
Her lips betray their virgin red, 
As they only blushed for this, 
That they one another kiss ; 
But observe, beside the rest, 
You shall know this felon best 
By her tongue 5 for if your ear 
Shall once a heavenly music hear, 
Such as neither gods nor men 
But from that voice shall hear again, 
That, that is she, oh, take her t'ye, 
None can rock heaven asleep but she. 

©tie 3Stru in a ©age. J 632. 



THE FOOL'S SONG. 1 

7T MONG- all sorts of people 

**■ The matter if we look well to ; 

1 In this song, SMrley follows motley by Ben Jonson.— See ante, 
closely a similar exaltation of the p. 114. 



224 Songs from the Dramatists. 

The fool is the best, he from the rest 

Will carry away the bell too. 
All places he is free of, 

And foots it without blushing 
At masks and plays, is not the bays 

Thrust out, to let the plush in *? 
Your fool is fine, he's merry, 

And of all men doth fear least, 
At every word he jests with my lord, 

And tickles my lady in earnest : 
The fool doth pass the guard now, 

He'll kiss his hand, and leg it, 
When wise men prate, and forfeit their state, 

Who but the fine fool will beg it 1 
He without fear can walk in 

The streets that are so stony ; 
Your gallant sneaks, your merchant breaks, 

He's a fool that does owe no money. 



STtje Sriump^ of 3P*ace* ]6§3. 



THE BREAKING UP OF THE MASQUE. 

/70ME away, away, away, 
V See the dawning of the day, 
Risen from the murmuring streams ; 
Some stars show with sickly beams, 
What stock of flame they are allowed, 
Each retiring to a cloud ; 
Bid your active sports adieu, 
The morning else will blush for you. 
Ye feather-footed hours run 
To dress the chariot of the sun ; 
Harness the steeds, it quickly will 
Be time to mount the eastern hill. 
The lights grow pale with modest fears, 
Lest you offend their sacred ears 



James Shirley. 225 

And eyes, that lent you all this grace ; 
Retire, retire, to your own place. 
And as you move from that blest pair, 
Let each heart kneel, and think a prayer, 
That all, that can make up the glory 
Of good and great may fill their story. 



St. $atrttffc for ErdanH. 1640. 



HANG CARE! 

I NEITHER will lend nor borrow, 
Old age will be here to-morrow j 
This pleasure we are made for, 
When death comes all is paid for : 
No matter what's the bill of fare, 
I'll take my cup, I'll take no care. 

Be wise, and say you had warning, 

To laugh is better than learning j 

To wear no clothes, not neat is ; 

But hunger is good where meat is: 
Give me wine, give me a wench, 
And let her parrot talk in French. 

It is a match worth the making, 
To keep the merry- thought waking j 
A song is better than fasting, 
And sorrow's not worth the tasting : 

Then keep your brain light as you can, 
An ounce of care will kill a man. 

S^e gtrcaota. )640. 



CUPID'S SEARCH FOR HIS MOTHER. 

rELL me tidings of my mother, 
Shepherds, and be Cupid's brother. 
Down from heaven we came together : 
With swan's speed came she not hither 1 
10a 



226 Songs from the Dramatists. 

But what lady have I spied? 
Just so was my mother eyed ; 
Such her smiles wherein I dwelt ; 
In those lips have I been felt ; 
Those the pillows of her breast, 
Which gave Cupid so much rest : 
'Tis she, 'tis she ! make holiday, 
Shepherds, carol, dance, and play. 
'Tis Venus, it can be no other ; 
Cupid now has found his mother ! 



Cupa anH Heatft* j653. 



THE COMMON DOOM. 

VICTORIOUS men of earth, no more 
* Proclaim how wide your empires are ; 
Though you bind in every shore, 
And your triumphs reach as far 

As night or day, 
Yet you, proud monarehs, must obey, 
And mingle with forgotten ashes, when 
Death calls ye to the crowd of common men. 

Devouring Famine, Plague, and "War, 

Each able to undo mankind, 
Death's servile emissaries are j 

Nor to these alone confined, 
He hath at will 

More quaint and subtle ways to Mil j 
A smile or Mss, as he will use the art, 
Shall have the cunning skill to break a heart. 



LOVE AND DEATH. 

/7HANGE, oh change your fatal bows, 
V Since neither knows 
The virtue of each other's darts ! 
Alas, what will become of hearts ! 



James Shirley. 227 

If it prove 

A death to love, 

We shall find 
Death will be cruel to be kind : 
For when he shall to armies fly, 
Where men think blood too cheap to buy 

Themselves a name, 
He reconciles them, and deprives 
The valiant men of more than lives, 

A victory and fame : 
Whilst Love, deceived by these cold shafts, instead 
Of curing wounded hearts, must kill indeed. 

Take pity, gods ! some ease the world will find 
To give young Cupid eyes, or strike Death blind : 
Death should not then have his own will, 
And Love, by seeing men bleed, leave off to kill. 

SC|je Contention of &jaj: anti Blesses. J 659. 



THE EQUALITY OF THE GRAVE. 1 

THE glories of our blood and state 
Are shadows, not substantial things ; 
There is no armour against fate ; 
Death lays his icy hand on kings : 
Sceptre and crown 
Must tumble down, 
And in the dust be equal made 
With the poor crooked scythe and spade. 

Some men with swords may reap the field, 
And plant fresh laurels where they kill ; 
But their strong nerves at last must yield ; 
They tame but one another still : 
Early or late, 
They stoop to fate, 
And must give up their murmuring breath, 
When they, pale captives, creep to death. 
1 This is said to have been a favourite song of Charles II. 



228 Songs from the Dramatists. 

The garlands wither on your brow. 

Then boast no more yonr mighty deeds ; 
Upon Death's purple altar now 

See. where the victor- victim bleeds : 
Your heads must come 
To the cold tomb, 
Only the actions of the just 
Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust. 



^#^ 



SIR WILLIAM DA VEX ANT. 
1605— 166S. 
If we cannot discover in the tedious poem of Gondibert 
any satisfactory evidence of that illustrious descent implied 
by the insinuation of TTood ; the following songs might 
justify a suspicion of Davenant's poetical lineage. The 
character of Davenant's verse is by no means Shake- 
sperean ; but there is a spirit in these pieces not unworthy 
of such a paternity. They possess an energy 

1 That lite a trumpet makes the spirits dance." 
The bounding versification fills the ear with music ; and 
they are distinguished by a breadth of treatment and knowl- 
edge of effect seldom so successfully displayed within 
such restricted limits. 

Ctje <Strg£ of RitiBS. 



WOMEN PREPARING FOR WAR. 

LET us live, live ! for, being dead, 
The pretty spots, 
Ribbons and knots. 
And the fine French dress for the head, 
Xo lady wears upon her 
In the cold, cold bed of honour. 
Beat down our grottos, and hew down our bowers, 
Dig up our arbours, and root up our flowers j 



Sir William Bavenant. 229 

Our gardens are bulwarks and bastions become; 
Then hang up our lute, we must sing to the drum. 

Our patches and our curls, 
So exact in each station, 
Our powders and our purls, 
Are now out of fashion. 
Hence with our needles, and give us your spades ; 
We, that were ladies, grow coarse as our maids. 
Our coaches have driven us to balls at the court, 
We now must drive barrows to earth up the fort. 

JEALOUSY. 

TNEIS cursed jealousy, what is't ? 
^ 'Tis love that has lost itself in a mist ; 
'Tis love being frighted out of his wits ; 
'Tis love that has a fever got ; 
Love that is violently hot, 
But troubled with cold and trembling fits. 
'Tis yet a more unnatural evil: 

'Tis the god of love, 'tis the god of love, possessed 
with a devil. 

'Tis rich corrupted wine of love, 

Which sharpest vinegar does prove ; 

From all the sweet flowers which might honey make, 

It does a deadly poison bring : 

Strange serpent which itself doth sting ! 

It never can sleep, and dreams still awake ; 

It stuffs up the marriage-bed with thorns. 

It gores itself, it gores itself, with imagined horns. 



5Ef)e sanfortunate Sobers. 



R 



love's lottery. 

UN to love's lottery ! Run, maids, and rejoice : 
When, drawing your chance, you meet your own 
choice ; 



230 Songs from the Dramatists. 

And boast that your luck you help with design, 
By praying cross-legged to Old Bishop Valentine. 
Hark, hark ! a prize is drawn, and trumpets sound ! 

Tan, ta, ra, ra, ra ! 

Tan, ta, ra, ra, ra ! 

Hark maids ! more lots are drawn ! prizes abound. 
Dub ! dub a, dub a, dub ! the drum now beats ! 
And, dub a, dub a, dub, echo repeats ; 
As if at night the god of war had made 
Love's queen a skirmish for a serenade. 

Haste, haste, fair maids, and come away ! 

The priest attends, your bridegrooms stay. 

Roses and pinks will be strewn where you go ) 
Whilst I walk in shades of willow, willow. 

When I am dead let him that did stay me 
Be but so good as kindly to lay me 
There where neglected lovers mourn, 
Where lamps and hallowed tapers burn, 
Where clerks in quires sad dirges sing, 
Where sweetly bells at burials ring. 

My rose of youth is gone 

Withered as soon as blown ! 

Lovers go ring my knell ! 

Beauty and love farewell ! 

And lest virgins forsaken 

Should, perhaps, be mistaken 
In seeking my grave, alas ! let them know 
I he near a shade of willow, willow. 



THE COQUET. 

>7^IS, in good truth, a most wonderful thing 
^ (I am even ashamed to relate it) 
That love so many vexations should bring, 
And yet few have the wit to hate it. 



Sir William Davenant 231 

Love's weather in maids should seldom hold fair : 
Like April's mine shall quickly alter ; 

I'll give him to-night a lock of my hair, 
To whom next day I'll send a halter. 

I cannot abide these malapert males, 

Pirates of love, who know no duty ; 
Yet love with a storm can take down their sails, 

And they must strike to Admiral Beauty. 

Farewell to that maid who will be undone, 
Who in markets of men (where plenty 

Is cried up and down) will die even for one ; 
I will live to make fools of twenty. 

&\)c 3Lab) Against SLobers. 



LOVE PROSCRIBED. 

7TYAKE all the dead ! what ho ! what ho ! 
**" How soundly they sleep whose pillows he low ? 
They mind not poor lovers who walk above 
On the decks of the world in storms of love. 

No whisper now nor glance shall pass 

Through wickets or through panes of glass ; 
For our windows and doors are shut and barred. 
Lie close in the church, and in the churchyard. 

In every grave make room, make room ! 

The world's at an end, and we come, we come. 

The state is now love's foe, love's foe ; 
Has seized on his arms, his quiver and bow ; 
Has pinioned his wings, and fettered his feet, 
Because he made way for lovers to meet. 

But O sad chance, his judge was old ; 

Hearts cruel grown, when blood grows cold. 
No man being young, his process would draw. 
heavens that love should be subject to law ! 

Lovers go woo the dead, the dead ! 

Lie two in a grave, and to bed, to bed ! 



232 Songs from the Dramatists. 

W$z Jftan's tt)e J&aster. 



A DRINKING ROUND. 

CHE bread is all baked, 
The embers are raked ; 
'Tis midnight now by chanticleer's first crowing ; 
Let's kindly carouse 
Whilst 'top of the house 
The cats fall out in the heat of their wooing. 
Time, whilst thy hour-glass does run out, 
This flowing glass shall go about. 
Stay, stay, the nurse is waked, the child does cry, 
No song so ancient is as lulla-by. 
The cradle's rocked, the child is hushed again, 
Then hey for the maids, and ho for the men. 
Now every one advance his glass ; 
Then all at once together clash ; 
Experienced lovers know 
This clashing does but shew, 
That, as in music, so in love must be 
Some discord to make up a harmony. 
Sing, sing ! When crickets sing why should not we ? 

The crickets were merry before us ; 
They sung us thanks ere we made them a fire. 

They taught us to sing in a chorus : 
The chimney's their church, the oven their quire. 
Once more the cock cries cock-a-doodle-doo. 
The owl cries o'er the barn, to-whit-to-whoo ! 
Benighted travellers now lose their way 

Whom Will-of-the-wisp bewitches : 
About and about he leads them astray 

Through bogs, through hedges, and ditches. 
Hark ! hark ! the cloister bell is rung ! 
Alas ! the midnight dirge is sung. 
Let 'em ring, 
Let 'em sing, 



MarJcham and Sampson. 233 

Whilst we spend the night in love and in laughter. 

When night is gone, 

then too soon 
The discords and cares of the day come after. 

Come boys ! a health, a health, a double health 
To those who 'scape from care by shunning wealth. 

Dispatch it away 

Before it be day, 
'Twill quickly grow early when it is late : 

A health to thee, 

To him, to me, 
To all who beauty love, and business hate. 



2T^e (Eruet Brother. 



GRIEVE NOT FOE, THE PAST. 

7TYEEP no more for what is past, 

^** For time in motion makes such haste 

He hath no leisure to descry 

Those errors which he passeth by. 

If we consider accident, 

And how repugnant unto sense 
It pays desert with bad event, 

We shall disparage Providence. 




GERVASE MARKHAM AND WILLIAM SAMPSON. 

These writers belong to the time of Charles I., in whose 
service Markham bore a captain's commission. He was a 
writer of some authority in his day on agriculture and hus- 
bandry. Of Sampson nothing is known except that he was 
the author of two plays, and assisted Markham in the piece 
from which the following song is taken. 



234 Songs from the Dramatists. 

SIMPLES TO SELL. 

/70ME will you buy ? for I have here 
H^ The rarest gums that ever were ; 
Gold is but dross, and features die, 
Else .ZEsculapius tells a lie. 
But I 

Come will you buy ? 

Have medicines for that malady. 

Is there a lady in this place, 
Would not be masked, but for her face ? 
O do not blush, for here is that 
Will make your pale cheeks plump and fat. 
Then why 

Should I thus cry, 

And none a scruple of me buy ? 

Come buy, you lusty gallants, 

These simples which I sell ; 
In all your days were never seen like these, 

For beauty, strength, and smell. 
Here's the king-cup, the pansy with the violet, 

The rose that loves the shower, 

The wholesome gilliflower, 
Both the cowslip, lily, 
And the daffodilly, 

With a thousand in my power. 

Here's golden amaranthus, 

That true love can provoke, 
Of horehound store, and poisoning helebore, 

With the polipode of the oak ; 
Here's chaste vervine, and lustful eringo, 

Health preserving sage, 

And rue which cures old age, 
With a world of others, 
Making fruitful mothers j 

All these attend me as my page. 



235 

JASPER MAYNE. 

1604—1672. 

Dr. Jasper Mayne was a distinguished preacher in the 
time of Charles I., and held two livings in the gift of the 
University of Oxford, from which he was expelled under 
the Commonwealth. At the Restoration, however, he was 
not only re-appointed to his former benefice, but made 
chaplain in ordinary to his Majesty, and archdeacon of 
Chichester. Dr. Mayne is said to have been a clergyman of 
the most exemplary character ; but there is an anecdote 
related of him which, if true, shows that he was also a 
practical humorist. He had an old servant to whom he 
bequeathed a trunk, which he told him contained something 
that would make him drink after his death. When the 
trunk was opened on the Doctor's demise, it was found to 
contain — a red-herring. 

Stye ©ttj Jftatc!)* 



THE WONDERFUL FISH. 

7TVE show no monstrous crocodile, 
*** Nor any prodigy of Nile ; 
No Remora that stops your fleet, 
Like Serjeant's gallants in the street ; 
No sea-horse which can trot or pace, 
Or swim false gallop, post, or race : 
For crooked dolphins we not care, 
Though on their back a fiddler were : 
The like to this fish, which we shew, 
Was ne'er in Fish-street, old, or new ; 
Nor ever served to the sheriff's board, 
Or kept in souse for the Mayor Lord. 
Had old astronomers but seen 
This fish, none else in heaven had been. 



236 Songs from the Dramatists. 

SIR SAMUEL TUKE. 

1673. 

B^e gftbentures of ©too 2£ours* 



% 



MISTAKEN KINDNESS. 

r AN Luciamira so mistake, 
To persuade me to fly ? 
'Tis cruel Mud for my own sake, 
To counsel me to die ; 
Like those faint souls, who cheat themselves of breath, 
And die for fear of death. 

Since Love's the principle of life, 

And you the object loved, 
Let's, Luciamira, end this strife, 

I cease to be removed. 
We know not what they do, are gone from hence, 
But here we love by sense. 

If the Platonics, who would prove 

Souls without bodies love, 
Had, with respect, well understood, 

The passions in the blood, 
They had suffered bodies to have had their part, 
And seated love in the heart. 



SIR WILLIAM KILLIGREW. 

1605—1693. 

Selintrra. 



THE HAPPY HOUR. 



d 



OME, come, thou glorious object of my sight, 
Oh my joy ! my life, my only delight ! 
May this glad minute be 
Blessed to eternity. 



John Dryden. 237 

See how the glimmering tapers of the sky. 
Do gaze, and wonder at our constancy, 

How they crowd to behold ! 

What our arms do infold ! 

How all do envy our f elicities ! 

And grudge the triumphs of Selindra's eyes : 

How Cynthia seeks to shroud 

Her crescent in yon cloud ! 

Where sad night puts her sable mantle on, 
Thy light mistaking, hasteth to be gone ; 
Her gloomy shades give way, 
As at the approach of day ; 
And all the planets shrink, in doubt to be 
Eclipsed by a brighter deity. 
Look, oh look ! 
How the small 
Lights do fall, 
And adore, 
What before 
The heavens have not shown, 
Nor their god-heads known ! 

Such a faith, 

Such a love 

As may move 

From above 
To descend ; and remain 
Amongst mortals again. 



JOHN DRYDEN. 

1631—1700. 

The songs scattered through Dryden's plays are strikingly 

inferior to the rest of his poetry. The confession he makes 

in one of his dedications that in writing for the stage he 



238 Songs from the Dramatists. 

consulted the taste of the audiences and not his own, and 
that, looking at the results, he was equally ashamed of the 
public and himself, applies with special force to his songs. 
They seem for the most part to have been thrown off merely 
to fill up a situation, or produce a transitory effect, without 
reference to substance, art, or beauty, in their structure. 
Like nearly all pieces written expressly for music, the con- 
venience of the composer is consulted in many of them 
rather than the judgment of the poet, although the world 
had a right to expect that the genius of Dryden would have 
vindicated itself by reconciling both. Some of the verses 
designed on this principle undoubtedly exhibit remarkable 
skill in accommodating the diction and rhythm to the 
demands of the air ; and, however indifferent they may be 
in perusal, it can be easily understood how effective their 
breaks, repetitions, and sonorous words (sometimes without 
much meaning in them) must have been in the delivery. 
Dryden descended to the smallest things with as much suc- 
cess as he soared to the highest; and, if he had cared to 
bestow any pains upon such compositions, two or three of 
the following specimens are sufficient to show with what a 
subtle fancy and melody of versification he might have 
enriched this department of our poetical literature. 

Many of the songs are stained with the grossness that 
denied the whole drama of the Eestoration. Others are 
metrical commonplaces not worth transplantation. From 
the nature of the subjects, the selection is necessarily 
scanty, although Dryden's plays yield a more plentiful crop 
of lyrics of various kinds than those of any of his contem- 
poraries. A larger collection might have been made, but 
that numerous songs, otherwise unobjectionable, are so 
closely interwoven with the business of the scene as to be 
inseparable from the dialogue. Of this character is the 
greater part of the opera of Albion andAlbanus, and nearly the 
whole of the lyrical version of the Tempest, a work in which 
Dryden appears to greater disadvantage than in any other 
upon which he was ever engaged. 



John Dryden. 239 

Qfyt JEixtiCan (Sttweiu 1664. 

INCANTATION. 

YOU twice ten hundred deities, 
To whom we daily sacrifice ; 
You Powers that dwell with fate below, 
And see what men are doomed to do, 
Where elements in discord dwell j 
Then God of Sleep arise and tell 
Great Zempoalla what strange fate 
Must on her dismal vision wait. 
By the croaking of the toad, 
In their caves that make abode ; 
Earthy Dun that pants for breath, 
With her swelled sides full of death ; 
By the crested adders' pride, 
That along the clifts do glide ; 
By thy visage fierce and black ; 
By the death's head on thy back; 
By the twisted serpents placed 
For a girdle round thy waist ; 
By the hearts of gold that deck 
Thy breast, thy shoulders, and thy neck : 
From thy sleepy mansion rise, 
And open thy unwilling eyes, 
While bubbling springs their music keep, 
That use to lull thee in thy sleep. 

SONG OF THE AERIAL SPIRITS. 

POOR mortals, that are clogged with earth below, 
Sink under love and care, 

While we, that dwell in air, 
Such heavy passions never know. 
Why then should mortals be 
Unwilling to be free 
From blood, that sullen cloud, 
Which shining souls does shroud ? 



240 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Then they'll shew "bright, 
And like us light, 
When leaving bodies with their care, 
Thev slide to us and air. 



2H)e fittiJtan Hmperor* 1665. 



THE FOLLY OF MAKING- TROUBLES. 

AH fading joy ! how quickly art thou past ! 
Yet we thy ruin haste. 
As if the cares of human life were few, 

We seek out new : 
And follow fate, which would too fast pursue. 

See how on every bough the birds express 

In their sweet notes their happiness. 

They all enjoy and nothing spare, 

But on their mother nature lay their care : 

Why then should man, the lord of all below, 

Such troubles choose to know, 

As none of all his subjects undergo ? 

Hark, hark, the waters, fall, fall, fall, 
And with a murmuring sound 
Dash, dash, upon the ground 
To gentle slumbers call. 

Secret Hobe j or, W$z J&at&en 4Bmeen. j667- 



CONCEALED LOVE. 

T FEED a flame within, which so torments me, 
-*• That it both pains my heart, and yet contents me : 
'Tis such a pleasing smart, and I so love it, 
That I had rather die, than once remove it. 

Yet he, for whom I grieve, shall never know it j 
My tongue does not betray, nor my eyes show it. 
Not a sigh, nor a tear, my pain discloses, 
But they fall silently, like dew on roses. 



John Dryden. 241 

Thus, to prevent my love from being cruel, 
My heart's the sacrifice, as 'tis the fuel : 
And while I suffer this to give him quiet, 
My faith rewards my love, though he deny it. 

On his eyes will I gaze, and there delight me ; 
While I conceal my love no frown can fright me : 
To be more happy, I dare not aspire ; 
Nor can I fall more low, mounting no higher. 

gsix J&arttn j$Car=gtfl \ or, 2Cf)e fftiQmtt Xtmocetice. 1667. 



DEEP IN LOVE. 

BLIND love, to this hour, 
Had ne'er, like me, a slave under his power : 
Then blessed be the dart, 
That he threw at my heart $ 
For nothing can prove 
A joy so great, as to be wounded with love. 

My days, and my nights, 
Are filled to the purpose with sorrows and frights : 

From my heart still I sigh, 

And my eyes are ne'er dry ; 
So that, Cupid be praised, 
I am to the top of love's happiness raised. 

My soul's all on fire, 
So that I have the pleasure to dote and desire : 

Such a pretty soft pain, 

That it tickles each vein j 
'Tis the dream of a smart, [heart. 

Which makes me breathe short, when it beats at my 

Sometimes^ in a pet, 
When I'm despised, I my freedom would get : 

But straight a sweet smile 

Does my anger beguile, 
And my heart does recal ; 
Then the more I do struggle, the lower I fall. 

11 



242 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Heaven does not impart 
Such a grace as to love unto every one's heart ; 

For many may wish 

To be wounded, and miss : 
Then blessed be love's fire, 
And more blessed her eyes, that first taught me desire. 



©grannie 3Lobej or, K%z 3£o£al J&artgr* J669. 



ST. CATHERINE ASLEEP. 

\7DU pleasing dreams of love and sweet delight, 
I Appear before this slumbering Virgin's sight : 
Soft visions set her free 
From mournful piety -, 
Let her sad thoughts from heaven retire ; 
And let the melancholy love 
Of those remoter joys above 
Give place to your more sprightly fire ; 
Let purling streams be in her fancy seen, 
And flowery meads, and vales of cheerful green ; 
And in the midst of deathless groves 
Soft sighing wishes lie, 
And smiling hopes fast by, 
And just beyond them ever-laughing loves. 



THE COURSE OF LOVE. 

7T H, how sweet it is to love ! 

-**» Ah, how gay is young desire ! 

And what pleasing pains we prove 

When we first approach love's fire ! 
Pains of love be sweeter far 
Than all other pleasures are. 

Sighs, which are from lovers blown 
Do but gently heave the heart : 
Even the tears they shed alone, 
Cure, like trickling balm, their smart. 



John Bryden. 243 

Lovers when they lose their breath, 
Bleed away in easy death. 

Love and time with reverence use; 

Treat them like a parting friend, 

Nor the golden gifts refuse, 

Which in youth sincere they send j 
For each year their price is more, 
And they less simple than before. 

Love, like spring-tides, full and high, 
Swells in every youthful vein j 
But each tide does less supply, 
Till they quite shrink in again : 

If a flow in age appear, 

'Tis but rain, and runs not clear. 



gtatibogna, ) 675. 

THE SEA FIGHT. 

7TYH0 ever saw a noble sight, 

^-J That never viewed a brave sea-fight ! 

Hang up your bloody colours in the air, 

Up with your lights, and your nettings prepare : 

Your merry mates cheer with a lusty bold spright, 

Now each man his brindice, and then to the fight. 

St. George ! St. George ! we cry, 

The shouting Turks reply. 

Oh now it begins, and the gun-room grows hot, 

Ply it with culverm and with small shot ; 

Hark, does it not thunder ? no, 'tis the gun's roar, 

The neighbouring billows are turned into gore ; 

Now each man must resolve to die, 

For here the coward cannot fly. 

Drums and trumpets toll the knell, 

And culverins the passing bell. 

Now, now they grapple, and now board amain ; 

Blow up the hatches, they're off all again : 



244 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Give them a broadside, the dice run at all, 
Down comes the mast, and yard and tacMings fall ; 
She grows giddy now, like blind Fortune's wheel, 
She sinks there, she sinks, she turns up her keel. 
Who ever beheld so noble a sight, 
As this so brave, so bloody sea-fight ! 



mibion arfO Sflftaims* J6S5. 



NEREIDS RISING FROM THE SEA. 

TTROM the low palace of old father Ocean, 
-■■ Come we in pity our cares to deplore 5 
Sea-racing dolphins are trained for our motion, 
Moony tides swelling to roll us ashore. 

Every nymph of the flood, her tresses rending, 
Throws off her armlet of pearl in the main ; 
Neptune in anguish his charge unattending, 
Vessels are foundering, and vows are in vain. 



a&ttifl gfttlmr ; ov t ©f>e aSritt*!) 3Uort|)£* J691. 



HARVEST HOME/ 

YOUR hay it is mowed, and your corn is reaped: 
Your barns will be full, and your hovels heaped : 
Come, my boys, come ; 
Come, my boys, come ; 
And merrily roar out harvest home ! 
Harvest home, 
Harvest home j 
And merrily roar out harvest home ! 

Come, my boys, come, &c. 

1 This rustic madrigal, with its sants. The introduction of Comus 

rant against the parsons, forms is as anomalous as the allusion to 

part of the enchantments of Mer- tithes, 
lin, and is sung hy Comus and pea- 



John Dryden. 245 

We have cheated the parson, we'll cheat him again, 
For why should a blockhead have one in ten ? 

One in ten, 

One in ten ) 
For why should a blockhead have one in ten, 

For prating so long like a book-learned sot, 
Till pudding and dumpling burn to pot, 

Burn to pot, 

Burn to pot ; 
Till pudding and dumpling burn to pot. 

Burn to pot, &c. 

We'll toss off our ale till we cannot stand : 
And hoigh for the honour of Old England : 

Old England, 

Old England ; 
And hoigh for the honour of Old England. 
Old England, &c. 



(ftleomenes ; or, ®t)e Spartan ?^ero, 1693. 

FIDELITY. 

nO, no, poor suffering heart, no change endeavour, 
Choose to sustain the smart, rather than leave her j 
My ravished eyes behold such charms about her, 
I can die with her, but not live without her f 
One tender sigh of hers to see me languish, 
Will more than pay the price of my past anguish ; 
Beware, O cruel fair, how you smile on me, 
'Twas a kind look of yours that has undone me. 

Love has in store for me one happy minute, 
And she will end my pain who did begin it ; 
Then no day void of bliss, of pleasure, leaving, 
Ages shall slide away without perceiving : 

1 As for the women, though we scorn and flout 'em, 
We may live with, hut cannot live without 'em. 

TJie Will. 



246 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Cupid shall guard the door, the more to please us, 
And keep out Time and Death, when they would seize 
Time and Death shall depart, and say, in flying, [us; 
Love has found out a way to live by dying. 



3Lobe ©riumptmtit ; or, Mature totll $rebaCL )693. 



THE TYRANT JEALOUSY. 

7TYHAT state of life can be so blessed 

*"W As love, that warms a lover's breast 

Two souls in one, the same desire 

To grant the bliss, and to require ! 

But if in heaven a hell we find, 

'Tis all from thee, 

Jealousy! 

'Tis all from thee, 

Thou tyrant, tyrant Jealousy, 

Thou tyrant of the mind ! 

All other ills, though sharp they prove, 

Serve to refine, and perfect love : 

In absence, or unkind disdain, 

Sweet hope relieves the lover's pain. 

But ah ! no cure but death we find, 

To set us free 

From Jealousy : 

Jealousy ! 

Thou tyrant, tyrant Jealousy, 

Thou tyrant of the mind. 

False in thy glass all objects are, 

Some set too near, and some too far ; 

Thou art the fire of endless night, 

The fire that burns and gives no light. 

All torments of the damned we find 

In only thee, 

Jealousy ! 

Thou tyrant, tyrant Jealousy, 

Thou tyrant of the mind ! 



Sir George Mherege. 247 

©tie Secular JJ&asque. 1760. 

THE SONG OF DIANA. 

mITH horns and with hounds, I waken the day, 
And hie to the woodland- walks away ; 
I tuck up my robe, and am buskined soon, 
And tie to my forehead a wexing moon. 1 
I course the fleet stag, unkennel the fox, 
And chase the wild goats o'er summits of rocks m , 
With shouting and hooting we pierce through the sky, 
And Echo turns hunter, and doubles the cry. 




SIR GEORGE ETHEREGE. 

1636 . 

Hobe in a STufc. 



BEAUTY NO ARMOUR AGAINST LOVE. 

LADIES, though to your conquering eyes 
Love owes his chiefest victories, 
And borrows those bright arms from you 
With which he does the world subdue, 
Yet you yourselves are not above 
The empire nor the griefs of love. 

Then wrack not lovers with disdain, 
Lest love on you revenge their pain j 
You are not free because y're fair ; 
The boy did not his mother spare. 

Beauty's but an offensive dart ; 

It is no armour for the heart. 

1 Wexing, or waxing, as Dryden has elsewhere employed it :— 

' 'Tis Venus' hour, and in the waxing moon, 
With chalk I first describe a circle here.' 

Tyrannic Love. 



248 Songs from the Dramatists. 

THOMAS SHADWELL. 
1640—1692. 
Shad well's plays abound in songs, but the bulk of them 
are too slovenly, frivolous, or licentious, to deserve pre- 
servation in a separate form. His comedies, admirable as 
pictures of contemporary meanness, supplied an appro- 
priate setting for his coarse and reckless verses ; but such 
pieces will not bear to be exhibited apart from the scenes 
for which they were designed. The following, however, may 
be accepted as characteristic of the time and the writer. 

STtje 538?oman <£aj)tattu 



THE ROARERS. 

CHE king's most faithful subjects we 
In's service are not dull, 
We drink, to show our loyalty, 

And make his coffers full. 
Would all his subjects drink like us, 

We'd make him richer far, 
More powerful and more prosperous 
Than all the Eastern monarchs are. 1 

E$e Amorous MiQot. 



LOVE IN YOUTH AND IN AGE. 

€HE fire of love in youthful blood, 
Like what is kindled in brushwood, 
But for a moment burns 5 
Yet in that moment makes a mighty noise. 
It crackles, and to vapour turns, 
And soon itself destroys. 

But when crept into aged veins 
It slowly burns, and long remains ; 

1 See ante, p. 147. Dryden, in his Shadwell could render the Mug 
Vindication of the Duke of Guise, was to increase the revenue by- 
says that the only loyal service drinking. 



Sir Charles Sedley. 249 

And with a sullen heat, 
Like fire in logs, it glows, and warms 'em long, 
And though the flame be not so great, 

Yet is the heat as strong. 

Simon of gttfjens, 

DAWN OF MORNING. 

CHE fringed vallanee of your eyes advance, 
Shake off your canopied and downy trance ; 
Phoebus already quaffs the morning dew, 
Each does his daily lease of life renew. 

He darts his beams on the lark's mossy house, 

And from his quiet tenement does rouse 

The little charming and harmonious fowl, 

Which sings its lump of body to a soul : 

Swiftly it clambers up in the steep air 

With warbling throat, and makes each note a stair. 

This the solicitous lover straight alarms, 
Who too long slumbered in his Celia's arms : 
And now the swelling spunges of the night 
With aching heads stagger from their delight : 
Slovenly tailors to their needles haste : 
Already now the moving shops are placed 
By those who crop the treasures of the fields, 
And all those gems the ripening summer yields. 




SIK CHARLES SEDLEY. 1639—1701. 
2Tf)e l&ttUierrg €?artretu 



A 1 



THE GROWTH OF LOVE. 

H Chloris ! that I now could sit 
As unconcerned, as when 
Your infant beauty could beget 
No pleasure nor no pain. 
11a 



250 Songs from the Dramatists. 

When I the dawn used to admire, 
And praised the coming day, 

I little thought the growing fire 
Must take my rest away. 

Your charms in harmless childhood lay, 
Like metals in the mine : 

Age from no face took more away, 
Than youth concealed in thine. 

But as your charms insensibly 
To their perfection pressed, 

Fond love as unperceived did fly, 
And in my bosom rest. 

My passion with your beauty grew, 

And Cupid at my heart, 
Still, as his mother favoured you, 

Threw a new naming dart. 

Each gloried in their wanton part ; 

To make a lover, he 
Employed the utmost of his art — 

To make a beauty she. 

Though now I slowly bend to love, 

Uncertain of my fate, 
If your fair self my chains approve, 

I shall my freedom hate. 

Lovers, like dying men, may well 

At first disordered be ; 
Since none alive can truly tell 

What fortune they must see. 



251 

TOM D'UEFEY. 

1723. 

W$z ©ontical S^tstorg of 20on (Stottrote* 



STILL WATER. 

DAMON let a friend advise ye, 
Follow Clores though she flies ye, 
Though her tongue your suit is slighting, 
Her Mnd eyes you'll find inviting : 
"Women's rage, like shallow water, 
Does but show their hurtless nature ; 
When the stream seems rough and frowning, 
There is still least fear of drowning. 

Let me tell the adventurous stranger, 
In our calmness lies our danger ; 
Like a river's silent running, 
Stillness shows our depth and cunning : 
She that rails ye into trembling, 
Only shows her fine dissembling 5 
But the fawner to abuse ye, 
Thinks ye fools, and so will use ye. 



ST&e ittofcew $ropf)ets j or, Heto W&it for a ^ttsfoanfcu 



THE FOP OP THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 

F HATE a fop that at his glass sits prinking half the 
*> With a sallow, frowsy, olive-coloured face, [day, 
And a powdered peruke hanging to his waist ; 
Who with ogling imagines to possess, 

And to show his shape 

Does cringe and scrape, 
But nothing has to say : 

Or if the courtship's fine, 

He'll only cant and whine, 
And in confounded poetry, he'll goblins make divine. 



252 Songs from the Dramatists. 

I love the bold and brave, 
I hate the fawning slave, 
Who quakes and cries. 
And sighs and lies, 
Yet wants the skill 
With sense to tell 
What 'tis he longs to have. 




SIR JOHN VANBEUGH. 

1666—1726. 
2Tf)e SEUlajjse ; or, Utrttte in ©anger* 



BEWARE OF LOVE. 

I SMILE at Love and all its arts, 
The charming Cynthia cried ; 
Take heed, for Love has piercing darts, 

A wounded swain replied j 
Once free and blessed as you are now, 

I trifled with his charms, 
I pointed at his little bow, 

And sported with his arms : 
Till urged too far, Revenge ! he cries, 

A fatal shaft he drew, 
It took its passage through your eyes, 

And to my heart it flew. 

To tear it thence I tried in vain, 

To strive I quickly found 
Was only to increase the pain, 

And to enlarge the wound. 
Ah ! much too well, I fear you know 

What pain I'm to endure, 
Since what your eyes alone could do 

Your heart alone can cure. 



Sir John Varibrugh. 253 

And that (grant Heaven I may mistake !) 

I doubt is doomed to bear 
A burthen for another's sake, 

Who ill rewards its care. 



$$e $roboftetr W$iU, 



LOVELESS BEAUTY. 

TTL Y, fly, you happy shepherds, fly ! 
A^ Avoid Philira's charms \ 
The rigor of her heart denies 

The heaven that's in her arms. 
Ne'er hope to gaze, and then retire, 

Nor yielding, to be blessed : 
Nature, who formed her eyes of fire, 

Of ice composed her breast. 

Yet, lovely maid, this once believe 

A slave whose zeal you move ; 
The gods, alas, your youth deceive, 

Their heaven consists in love. 
In spite of all the thanks you owe, 

You may reproach 'em this, 
That where they did their form bestow, 

They have denied their bliss. 



LEARNED WOMEN. 

ONCE on a time, a nightingale 
To changes prone ; 
Unconstant, fickle, whimsical, 

(A female one) 
Who sung like others of her kind, 
Hearing a well-taught linnet's airs, 
Had other matters in her mind, 
To imitate him she prepares. 



254 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Her fancy straight was on the wing : 

' I fly,' quoth she, 

' As well as he ; 

I don't know why 

I should not try 
As well as he to sing.' 

From that day forth she changed her note, 
She spoiled her voice, she strained her throat : 
She did, as learned women do, 

Till everything 

That heard her sing, 
Would run away from her — as I from you. 




WILLIAM CONGEEVE. 1672—1728 
Hobe for 2Lobe + 



THE ORACLE. 

A NYMPH and a swain to Apollo once prayed, 
The swain had been jilted, the nymph been betrayed: 
Their intent was to try if his oracle knew 
E'er a nymph that was chaste, or a swain that was true. 
Apollo was mute, and was like t' have been posed, 
But sagely at length he this secret disclosed : 
1 He alone won't betray in whom none will confide : 
And the nymph maybe chaste that has never been tried.' 

love's infidelities. 

I TELL thee, Charmion, could I time retrieve, 
And could again begin to love andjive, 
To you I should my earliest offering give ; 
I know my eyes would lead my heart to you, 
And I should all my vows and oaths renew ) 
But, to be plain, I never would be true. 



William Congreve. 255 

For by our weak and weary truth I find, 
Love hates to centre in a point assigned : 
But runs with joy the circle of the mind : 
Then never let us chain what should be free, 
But for relief of either sex agree : 
Since women love to change, and so do we. 

8Ti)e ffl^as of t$e fflfflTortou 



LOVE'S AMBITION. 

LOVE'S but the frailty of the mind, 
When 'tis not with ambition joined ; 
A sickly flame, which, if not fed, expires, 
And feeding, wastes in self -consuming fires. 

'Tis not to wound a wanton boy, 
Or amorous youth, that gives the joy; 
But 'tis the glory to have pierced a swain, 
For whom inferior beauties sighed in vain. 

Then I alone the conquest prize, 

When I insult a rival's eyes : 
If there's delight in love, 'tis when I see 
That heart, which others bleed for, bleed for me. 

DRINKING SONG. 

PRITHEE fill me the glass, 
Till it laugh in my face, 
With ale that is potent and mellow ; 
He that whines for a lass, 
Is an ignorant ass, 
For a bumper has not its fellow. 

We'll drink and we'll never ha' done, boys, 

Put the glass then around with the sun, boys, 
Let Apollo's example invite us j 

For he's drunk every night, 

And that makes him so bright, 
That he's able next morning to light us. 



256 Songs from the Dramatists. 

To drink is a Christian diversion, 
Unknown to the Turk or the Persian : 

Let Mahometan fools 

Live by heathenish rules, 
And be damned over tea-cnps and coffee ; 

But let British lads sing, 

Crown a health to the king, 
And a fig for your sultan and sophy! 




GEORGE FARQUHAR. 1678—1707. 
SLobe antr a SSottle. 



FALSE LOVE ONLY IS BLIND. 

T20W blessed are lovers in disguise ! 
■*■/ Like gods, they see, 

As I do thee, 
Unseen by human eyes. 

Exposed to view, 

I'm hid from you, 
I'm altered, yet the same : 

The dark conceals me, 

Love reveals me ; 
Love, which lights me by its flame. 

Were you not false, you me would know j 

For though your eyes 

Could not devise, 
Your heart had told you so. 

Your heart would beat 

With eager heat, 
And me by sympathy would find : 

True love might see 

One changed like me, 
False love is only blind. 



Richard Brinsley Sheridan. 257 



WIT IN JAIL. 

T^HE Tower confines the great, 
^ The spunging-house the poor ; 
Thus there are degrees of state 

That even the wretched must endure. 
Virgil, though cherished in courts, 

Eelates but a splenetic tale : 
Cervantes revels and sports, 

Although he writ in a jail. 




RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN. 



LOVE FOR LOVE. 

I NE'ER could any lustre see 
In eyes that would not look on me; 
I ne'er saw nectar on a lip, 
But where my own did hope to sip. 
Has the maid who seeks my heart 
Cheeks of rose, untouched by art ? 
I will own the colour true, 
When yielding blushes aid their hue. 

Is her hand so soft and pure ? 
I must press it, to be sure ; 
Nor can I be certain then, 
Till it, grateful, press again. 
Must I, with attentive eye, 
Watch her heaving bosom sigh *? 
I will do so, when I see 
That heaving bosom sigh for me. 



258 Songs from the Dramatists. 

CONDITIONS OF BEAUTY. 

GIVE Isaac the nymph who no beauty can boast, 
But health and good humour to make her his toast ; 
If straight, I don't mind whether slender or fat, 
And six feet or four — we'll ne'er quarrel for that. 

Whate'er her complexion I vow I don't care, 
If brown, it is lasting — more pleasing, if fair : 
And though in her face I no dimples should see, 
Let her smile — and each dell is a dimple to me. 

Let her locks be the reddest that ever were seen, 
And her eyes may be e'en any colour but green ; 
For in eyes, though so various the lustre and hue, 
I swear I've no choice — only let her have two. 

'Tis true I'd dispense with a throne on her back ; 
And white teeth, I own, are genteeler than black ; 
A little round chin too's a beauty, I've heard j 
But I only desire she mayn't have a beard. 

THE SUNSHINE OF AGE. 

OH, the days when I was young, 
When I laughed in fortune's spite ; 
Talked of love the whole day long, 

And with nectar crowned the night ! 
Then it was, old father Care, 

Little recked I of thy frown ; 

Half thy malice youth could bear, . 

And the rest a bumper drown. 

Truth, they say, lies in a well, 

Why I vow I ne'er could see °, 
Let the water-drinkers tell, 

There it always lay for me : 
For when sparkling wine went round, 

Never saw I falsehood's mask j 
But still honest truth I found 

In the bottom of each flask. 



Richard Brinsley Sheridan. 259 

True, at length my vigour's flown, 

I have years to bring decay -, 
Few the locks that now I own, 

And the few I have are grey. 
Yet, old Jerome, thou mayst boast, 

While thy spirits do not tire ; 
Still beneath thy age's frost, 

Glows a spark of youthful fire. 



DRINKING GLEE. 

€HIS bottle's the sun of our table, 
His beams are rosy wine j 
We, planets, that are not able 
Without his help to shine. 
Let mirth and glee abound ! 

You'll soon grow bright 
With borrowed light, 
And shine as he goes round ! 



2C|)0 School Ux Scantial, 



LET THE TOAST PASS. 



THERE'S to the maiden of bashful fifteen ; 
*■/ Here's to the widow of fifty ; 
Here's to the flaunting extravagant quean, 
And here's to the housewife that's thrifty. 

Let the toast pass, 

Drink to the lass, 
I'll warrant she'll prove an excuse for the glass. 

Here's to the charmer whose dimples we prize, 
Now to the maid who has none, sir : 

Here's to the girl with a pair of blue eyes, 
And here's to the nymph with but one, sir. 
Let the toast pass, &c. 



260 Songs from the Dramatists. 

Here's to the maid with a bosom of snow ; 

Now to her that's as brown as a berry : 
Here's to the wife with a face full of woe, 

And now to the damsel that's merry. 

Let the toast pass, &c. 

For let 'em be clumsy, or let 'em be slim, 
Young or ancient, I care not a feather ; 
So fill a pint bumper quite up to the brim, 
So fill up your glasses, nay, fill to the brim, 
And let us e'en toast them together. 

Let the toast pass, &C. 1 

1 These gay and flowing verses, modelled on the following song in 
perhaps the most popular of their Suckling's play of the Goblins : 
class in the language, are evidently 

' A health to the nut-brown lass 
With the hazel eyes, let it pass, 

She that has good eyes, &c. 
Let it pass— let it pass. 

As much to the lively grey, 

'Tis as good in the night as the day, 

She that hath good eyes, <fcc. 
Drink away— drink away. 

I pledge, I pledge, what ho ! some wine, 
Here's to thine— here's to thine ! 

The colours are divine ; 
But oh ! the black, the black, 
Give me as much again, and let 't be sack ; 

She that hath good eyes,' <fcc. 

This song was appropriated by ist, and had the audacity to publish 

S. Sheppard, in a comedy called the lines without any acknowledg- 

the Committee-man curried, 1647. ment of the source from whence 

Sheppard was a notorious plagiar- he stole them. 



Index to the First Lines of the Songs. 



PAGE 

A curse upon thee, for a slave ! 162 

Adieu ; farewell, earth's bliss 69 

Agiiicourt, Agincourt ! know ye not Agincourt ? 198 

Ah Chloris ! that I now could sit 249 

Ah fading joy ! how quickly art thou passed ! 240 

Ah ! how sweet it is to love ! 242 

All a green willow, willow 25 

All that glisters is not gold 86 

All ye woods and trees, and bowers 135 

Among all sorts of people 223 

And to begin 23 

And will he not come again % 103 

A nymph and a swain to Apollo once prayed 254 

Arm, arm, arm, arm ! the scouts are all come in 138 

Art thou god to shepherd turned 93 

Art thou gone in haste? 185 

Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers ? 180 

A thing very fit 16 

At Venus' entreaty for Cupid her son 61 

Autumn hath all the summer's fruitful treasure 69 

Back and side go bare, go bare 33 

Beauty, alas! where wast thou born 65 

Beauty arise, show forth thy glorious shining 181 

Beauty clear and fair 122 

Be merry, friends, take ye no thought 26 

Black spirits and white, red spirits and gray 169 

Blind Cupid, lay aside thy bow. 191 

Blind love, to this hour 241 

Blow, blow, thou winter wind 91 

Brave Don, cast your eyes on our gipsy fashions 175 

Broom, Broom on hill 46 

Broom, broom, the bonny broom ! 139 



262 Index. 

PAGE 

Call for tlie robin red-breast and the wren 182 

Can Luciamira so mistake 236 

Can you paint a thought ? or number 209 

Cast away care ; he that loves sorrow 208 

Cast our caps and cares away 125 

Change, oh change your fatal bows 226 

Cold's the wind, and wet's the rain 178 

Come away, away, away. 224 

Come away, come away 168 

Come away, come away, death 89 

Come away, thou lady gay 144 

Come, come, thou glorious object of my sight 236 

Come, follow your leader, follow 173 

Come, Fortune's a jade, I care not who tell her 146 

Come hither, you that love, and hear me sing , 151 

Come let the state stay 213 

Come list and hark, the bell doth toll 196 

Come, my Celia, let ns prove 115 

Come, my children, let your feet 157 

Come, my dainty doxies 170 

Come, shepherds, come 129 

Come, sleep, and, with thy sweet deceiving 160 

Come, thou monarch of the vine 109 

Come unto these yellow sands 98 

Come will you buy? for I have here 234 

Come you whose loves are dead 153 

Comforts lasting, loves encreasing 210 

Cupid and my Campaspe played 50 

Cupid, pardon what is past 158 

Damon, let a friend advise you 251 

Dearest, do not delay me 123 

Did not the heavenly rhetoric of thine eye 79 

Done to death by slanderous tongues 87 

Do nothing but eat, and make good cheer 100 

Do not fear to put thy feet 134 

Down, ye angry waters all ! 149 

Drink to-day, and drown all sorrow 145 

Drink to me only with thine eyes 121 

Enter a maid ; but made a bride 203 

Fair and fair, and twice as fair 58 

Fair Apollo, whose bright beams 188 



Index. 263 

PAGE 

Fair summer droops, droop men and beasts therefore 68 

Fancies are but streams 206 

Fear no more the heat o' the sun 104 

Fill it up, fill it up to the brink 214 

Fine young folly, though you were 218 

Fly, fly, you happy shepherds, fly ! 253 

Fly hence shadows, that do keep 209 

Foolish, idle toys 187 

Fools had ne'er less grace in a year 106 

Fools, they are the only nation 114 

For I'll cut my green coat, a foot above my knee 160 

For Jillian of Berry, she dwells on a hill 153 

From the east to western Ind 92 

From the low palace of old father Ocean 244 

From thy forehead thus I take 130 

Full fathom five thy father lies 98 

Fy on a sinful fantasy ! 88 

Gently dip, but not too deep 62 

Get you hence, for I must go 97 

Give Isaac the nymph who no beauty could boast 258 

Glories, pleasures, pomps, delights and ease 211 

Go, happy heart ! for thou shalt lie 137 

Golden slumbers Mss your eyes 180 

Good morrow, 'tis Saint Valentine's day 102 

Grieve not, fond man, nor let one tear 192 



Hail, beauteous Dian, queen of shades 201 

Hark ! hark ! the lark at heaven's gate sings 104 

Hark, now everything is still 183 

Hast thou seen the down in the air 214 

Haymakers, rakers, reapers, and mowers 207 

Hear ye ladies that despise 143 

Hence, all you vain delights 162 

Hence merrily fine to get money 182 

Here lies the blithe spring 207 

Here's to the maiden of bashful fifteen 259 

Hey dery dery, with a lusty dery 45 

His golden locks time hath to silver turned 60 

Honour, riches, marriage-blessing 99 

Hot sun, cool fire, tempered with sweet air 63 

How blessed are lovers in disguise ! 256 

How round the world goes, and everything that's in it 176 

How should I your true love know 102 



264 Index. 



PAGE 

I am gone, sir 89 

I care not for these idle toys 184 

I could never nave the power 122 

If all these Cupids now were blind 116 

I feed a flame within, which so torments me 240 

If I freely may discover 112 

If love make me forsworn, how shall I swear to love % 78 

If she he made of white and red 78 

I hate a fop that at his glass sits prinking half the day 251 

I have a pretty titmouse 48 

Immortal gods, I claim no pelf 108 

I mun he married a Sunday 18 

In a maiden-time professed 168 

In a silent shade, as I sat a sunning 43 

I ne'er could any lustre see 257 

I neither will lend nor horrow 225 

In love's name you are charged herehy 223 

In youth when I did love, did love 103 

Io Bacchus ! to thy table 55 

Isis, the goddess of this land 140 

I smile at love and all its arts 252 

I tell thee, Charmion, could I time retrieve 254 

It was a beauty that I saw 120 

It was a lover and his lass 94 

I would not be a serving-man 153 

Jog on, jog on, the footpath way 97 

King Stephen was a worthy peer 105 

Knocks go and come 101 

Ladies, though to your conquering eyes 247 

Lawn, as white as driven snow 97 

Lay a garland on my hearse 122 

Let the bells ring, and let the boys sing 124 

Let those complain that feel Love's cruelty 148 

Let us live, live ! for, being dead 228 

Like to Diana in her summer weed 66 

Live with me still, and all the measures 206 

London, to thee I do present 154= 

Love's but the frailty of the mind 255 

Love for such a cherry lip 166 

Love, love, nothing but love, still more ! 109 

Love is a law, a discord of such force 184 

Love is blind, and a wanton 113 



Index. 265 

PAGE 

Love is like a lamb, and love is like a lion 165 

Love is the sire, dam, nurse, and seed 216 

Lovers, rejoice ! your pains shall he rewarded . . 158 

Love's a lovely lad 186 

Lullahy, lullaby, baby 190 

Maistee Roister Doister will straight go home and die 19 

Melampus, when will Love be void of fears ? 61 

Melpomene, the muse of tragic songs 59 

My Daphne's hair is twisted gold 54 

My man Thomas 143 

My masters, my friends, and good people, draw near 117 

My shag-hair Cyclops, come, let's ply 51 

Now does jolly Janus greet your merriment 185 

Now fie on Love, it ill befits 191 

Now having leisure, and a happy wind 156 

No, no, fair heretic, it needs must be 213 

No, no, poor suffering heart, no change endeavour 245 

Now the hungry lion roars 84 

Now the lusty spring is seen 142 

Now, until the break of day 84 

Now what is love I will thee tell 195 

Now, whilst the moon doth rule the sky 131 

O ckuel Love, on thee I lay 51 

O Cupid ! monarch over kings 56 

O for a bowl of fat canary 167 

O gentle Love, ungentle for thy deed 58 

Oh, fair sweet face ! oh, eyes celestial bright 156 

Oh, fair, sweet goddess, queen of loves 138 

Oh, how my lungs do tickle ! ha, ha, ha 163 

Oh, no more, no more, too late ; 210 

Oh, sorrow, sorrow, say where dost thou dwell 189 

Oh, the days when I was young 258 

Oh, turn thy bow ! 161 

O, let us howl some heavy note 183 

O Mistress mine, where are you roaming ? 88 

On a day, (alack the day !) 80 

Once on a time, a nightingale 253 

O stay, O turn, O pity me 187 

O, that joy so soon should waste ! Ill 

O, the month of May, the merry month of May 178 

Orpheus I am, come from the deeps below 137 

Orpheus with his lute made trees 101 

12 



266 Index. 

PAGE 

Opinion, how dost thou molest 73 

Over hill, over dale 82 

O yes, O yes, if any maid 53 

Pan's Syrinx was a girl indeed 54 

Pardon, goddess of the night 87 

Pinch him, pinch him, black and blue 53 

Pipe, merry Annot 15 

Pity, pity, pity ! 166 

Pleasures, beauty, youth attend ye 211 

Poor mortals, that are clogged with earth below 239 

Prithee fill me the glass 255 

Queen, and huntress, chaste and fair 112 

Rise from the shades below 126 

Roses, their sharp spines being gone 159 

Run to love's lottery ! run, maids, and rejoice 229 



all, and maidens fair 129 

She's pretty to walk with 213 

Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more 87 

Since you desire my absence 186 

Sing his praises that doth keep 128 

Sing to Apollo, god of day 55 

Slow, slow, fresh fount, keep time with my salt tears no 

So beauty on the waters stood 115 

So sweet a kiss the golden sun gives not 79 

Spite of his spite, which that in vain 40 

Spring, the sweet spring, is the year's pleasant king 68 

Stand ! who goes there 1 52 

Still to be neat, still to be drest 116 

Take, oh ! take those lips away 95 

Take, oh ! take those lips away 147 

Tell me dearest, what is love ? 150 

Tell me tidings of my mother 225 

Tell me what is that only thing 156 

Tell me where is fancy bred? 85 

The blushing rose, and purple flower 202 

The bread is all baked 232 

The fire of love in youthful blood 248 

The fit's upon me now 125 

The fringed vallance of your eyes advance 249 

The gentry to the King's Head 196 



Index. 267 

PAGE 

The glories of our blood and state 227 

The king's most faithful subjects we 248 

The master, the swabber, the boatswain, and 1 99 

The poor soul sat singing by a sycamore tree 106 

The Spaniard loves his ancient slop 199 

The Tower confines the great 257 

The woosel-cock, so black of hue 83 

Then, in a free and lofty strain 114 

Then is there mirth in heaven 95 

Then our music is in prime 215 

There is not any wise man 187 

This bottle's the sun of our table 259 

This cursed jealousy, what is it? 229 

This way, this way come, and hear 142 

Thou deity, swift-winged Love 161 

Thou divinest, fairest, brightest 135 

Thou more than most sweet glove Ill 

Thou that art called the bright Hyperion 197 

Though I am young and cannot tell 120 

Thrice the brinded cat hath mewed 107 

Through yon same bending plain 126 

Thy best hand lay on this turf of grass 174 

'Tis, in good truth, a most wonderful thing 230 

'Tis late and cold; stir up the fire 149 

'Tis mirth that fills the veins with blood 152 

Tobacco's a Musician 220 

Trip it, gipsies, trip it fine 172 

Under the greenwood tree 90 

Urns and odours bring away ! 160 

Victorious men of earth, no more 226 

Virtue's branches wither, virtue pines 177 

Wake all the dead ! what ho ! what ho ! 231 

Wake, our mirth begins to die 113 

Walking in a shady grove 76 

Was this fair face the cause, quoth she 82 

Wedding is great Juno's crown 95 

Weep eyes, break heart ! 171 

Weep no more for what is past 233 

Weep no more, nor sigh, nor groan 152 

Weep, weep, ye woodmen wail 192 

Weep, weep, you Argonauts 190 

Welladay, welladay, poor Colin, thou art going to the ground. 59 



268 Index. 

PAGE 

Welcome, thrice welcome to this shady green 204 

We show no monstrous crocodile 235 

What bird so sings, yet so does wail ? 50 

What bird so sings, yet so does wail? 206 

What heart can think, or tongue express 29 

What powerful charms my streams do bring 133 

What shall he have that killed the deer ? 93 

What state of life can be so blessed 246 

What thing is love ? for sure love is a thing 62 

Whenas the rye reach to the chin 62 

When daffodils begin to peer 96 

When daisies pied, and violets blue 80 

When shall we three meet again 107 

When that I was and a little tiny boy 89 

When travels grete in matters thick 38 

When wanton love hath walked astray 43 

Where the bee sucks, there suck 1 100 

While you here do snoring lie 99 

Whither shall I go 186 

Who ever saw a noble sight 243 

Who is Silvia? What is she? 77 

Who so to marry a minion wife 17 

Why art thou slow, thou rest of trouble, Death 203 

Why should this desert silent be ? 92 

Why so pale and wan, fond lover ? c 212 

Will you buy any tape 98 

With fair Ceres, Queen of Grain 198 

With horns and with hounds, I waken the day 247 

Woodmen, shepherds, come away 222 

Ye be welcome, ye be welcome 31 

Ye little birds that sit and sing 198 

You pleasing dreams of love and sweet delight 242 

Your hay it is mowed, and your corn is reaped 244 

You spotted snakes, with double tongue 83 

You stole my love ; fy upon you, fy ! 44 

You that seek to sunder love 44 

You twice ten hundred deities 239 



THE END. 



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